Chapter 06

Youngest of Pieces: Girls Power (10)

“When it comes to the stage they are always praised to be flawless. At the start of the year they made a surprising comeback that made probably the whole country fall off their chairs, and now they are back with an album that the whole world is talking about this week. Five rebelling girls who we have seen grow unto beautiful young women. 5 Pieces, welcome!”

“Pieces of one,” Carolina happily says through the microphone on the table, and 5 Pieces in choir greets; “Hello, we are 5 Pieces.”

Radio DJ K.Will claps his hands, smiling widely and giving out a low ‘wooo’ for the radio before laughing as he can see the staff behind the glass looking happy too and the ladies looks over as well. Hannah is wearing a pair of leggings, two long and loose tank tops with a cardigan on top, a simple and elegant look with high heels and a long necklace. The ladies are sitting kind of like in their usual seats with three members on one side of the DJ and on the other side it is Carolina and Maria. Usually Hannah would sit next to K.Will as that is her middle position, but she had asked Emelia to change seat as she finds it awkward to sit next to the DJ, meaning Hannah is now sitting between Julia and Emelia.

“You have released a new album!” K.Will starts off saying with excitement to them. “And it isn’t the usual concept either, is it?”

“This time we have really gone beyond our own imagination, for sure,” Maria laughs.

Hannah can’t stop smiling. They are all super happy to be here at K.Will’s radio, and mostly because when they arrived everyone there kept talking about the concept and album and just showing such an amazing reaction that the ladies are unstoppably smiling. What Hannah is happy over that their first radio program is with K.Will is that he knows the ladies, he knows Jonghyun too, and there is no way he will ask weird questions to Hannah because his focus is on the music and the group.

The ladies promote their album and explain the concept, brightly talking, and Hannah is sitting with that silly smile in her face when K.Will asks (his head turning left and right to look at them all) who the ladies think suits the concept the best.

“I think Carolina is blooming out for this comeback,” Hannah cutely says while the other ladies are just thinking.

“Why do you think that?” Carolina asks in a panicked way, making the DJ laugh as if it isn’t a compliment at all. Hannah laughs too and nods when K.Will asks the same question Carolina asked.

“The red hair is pretty and her voice is really nice,” Hannah kindly compliments, smiling at the girl sitting across from her who is starting to smile knowing it is a compliment.

“Thank you,” Carolina says and holds out her hand – missing two meters to reach Hannah – and just points at her before happily smiling at the DJ.

“I think I suit the new concept the best,” Maria comments, being overly confident by herself while Emelia tells her to not go there. “All of us look good on the stage but I am just shining up there.”

“You’re so full of it,” Emelia chuckles and turns to K.Will; “I don’t think it matters what concept we do, Maria will still imagine she is number one.”

Maria nods left to right, “Probably true.”

“Who do you think suits the concept the best then, Emelia?” K.Will asks, his whole face is smiling as if he had forgotten for a while how 5 Pieces is relaxing and funny to have as guests. With these types of guests, his job is easy because these ladies just follow his flow. Emelia smirks to be asked and she gives each member a quick look, to which K.Will laughs, and to which Julia whispers something to Hannah. “Right now, Emelia is scanning the ladies… What is the result?”

“Hannah.”

“Liar,” Hannah and Julia both says in choir as soon as the name has been said – Julia told Hannah to say ‘liar’ with her whatever answer Emelia gives. Emelia hits Hannah on the arm – very light – but it makes Hannah lean on Julia, laughing.

“Why is that a lie?” K.Will asks with a chuckle; they are all in a good mood.

“I think Hannah suits the concept very well,” Emelia answers, holding on to Hannah’s arm with her long weak fingers as a warning for Hannah to not repeat ‘liar’ again.

“But why did they say you’re a liar?” K.Will is having fun.

“That’s because Julia knew I wouldn’t say her name,” Emelia answers, looking over at the two girls sitting closely together with huge smiles, “And Hannah is too innocent to know she is being used.”

Hannah giggles, leaning on Julia who is leaning forward at the table. “All five of us are suited for this concept,” Julia starts explaining for their DJ. “But Emelia has so far said the same thing Maria said; they name themselves as the ones best suited. Emelia, don’t put up an act, our fans will know you’re not being honest.”

The others are just laughing, maybe more at how bold Julia is rather than what she actually is saying. Emelia can not be heard though; she is silently smirking by herself. In the end K.Will asks Emelia what she has to say for herself, and the rapper looks so cool with her long hair and pale skin, smirking when saying; “I don’t think it’s okay to name myself, so I name Hannah instead because she looks super great on the stage for this concept.”

“And she has pink hair, it is something no one thought we would see without Photoshop,” Carolina comments.

The topic changes with that one admiring comment from Carolina – who loves pink – to 5 Pieces’ transformation with hair colours most of all. Hannah keeps touching her own hair at that, by herself thinking it is indeed a colour she never thought she would wear. After talking about hair; K.Will isn’t very interested in that, and asks another question instead; “Who was the most stressed out about this new concept?”

Hannah leans back in her seat to be able to see both Julia and Emelia next to her, but her eyes are on Maria and Carolina across the table with the microphones between them to capture every sound they give out for the radio. She wonders if anyone is even listening to the ladies by now on this channel.

“All of us have one word to describe what we felt preparing for this comeback and that is terrified,” Maria answers.

“Terrified?” K.Will looks shocked.

“Since day one when we were told about the concept, we were honestly terrified. It is a concept different from anything we have done before… we were just really worried if we could pull it off or not. It is an amazing concept and I think we thought it was beyond what we could handle,” Maria honestly answers, surprising their DJ but the ladies only agreeing.

“It wasn’t until we were on set for the music video that we actually thought we can probably do this concept,” Emelia admits.

“But what were you terrified of? The whole album is topping great…” K.Will looks surprised still.

“Yeah, but we know it is an image and concept our fans aren’t used seeing us with, so we were terrified of how our fans would like this upgrade,” Emelia says. “Personally, now, we enjoy the concept, we just needed some time to make it our own style and it makes us deeply thankful that our fans seems to like it too.”

“The thing about our album,” Carolina starts to say, “Is that it is a mix of so many different things. We go back some decades, it has soul, we focus a lot on the actual music, we mix it with today’s pop and R&B – the concept of the comeback was really mixed at first, we had some trouble to add 5 Pieces in it. That’s where our crew comes in. We have a band and dancers keeping our moods up and teachers constantly giving us confidence; while practicing, we think the whole crew working together made us confident to give our best to the new image and just go full-out 5 Pieces’ style.”

“Then, we have now brought up the concept and your transformation,” K.Will brings up, “Now it is time to talk about the music, which Carolina slightly mentioned: 5 Pieces always bring out a lot of different genres in your albums, and your fourth album [Girls Power] is nothing than that - different. You have mixed up a lot of genres in this album, giving listeners a wide hearing of your voices and like you all have said it is a an album giving us a few of the older sounds as well. To talk about the songs, what were your own reactions to it and is there a specific track in the album you would recommend for our listeners here tonight to listen to?”

Selling, that is the word Hannah thinks of when he talks. When 5 Pieces is on the stage they have a blast with their fans, during radio they tend to be relaxed but they still need to sell themselves and their album by giving out their personalities and talk well.

“All the songs in the album have its own style, which will be fun to listen to,” Carolina says, sitting straight now when the topic is about their music and not the concept. “We had a lot of fun with the music, challenging our voices which I think listeners will really like. For me I had a lot of fun in the recording-studio-”

“Carolina has helped out producing and writing songs,” Hannah is fast to happily interrupt, receiving a bright smile from Carolina as someone else brings it up for her. Maybe these two girls are starting a new love-line, from across the table smiling and pointing at each other while K.Will says he has listened through the album several of times and is amazed by how good the songs are, asking about Carolina’s participation in the making.

“I have had a lot of interest in making music for some time and it was really fun working on this album,” Carolina admits, but they don’t say much more of that as they return to the main question about their thoughts on the songs and recommendations. “My recommendation to ‘Young Street’ radio would be the song [Run, My Love], which is a duet of me and Maria, and I worked with the brilliant Yoo Young Jin to create it.”

“Oh, I really like that song,” K.Will admits, “If our listeners haven’t listened to the song yet, it is a beautiful love confession ballad sung by Maria and Carolina. Beautiful is only the cherry on top of it, so please listen to it.”

“You really have listened to the whole album?” Julia asks him, smiling with fascination.

“Yes! I listened to it as soon as it came out,” K.Will answers. “What about the other members? Thoughts and recommendations?”

“It’s Friday evening,” Julia starts to say, “Which means a lot of people might want to go out dancing, right? I recommend [The Best], it is more of a rap track but it is Carolina and Emelia who wrote it, so if you want to dance uncontrollably that is one of the best tracks for it.”

All Hannah can think of is that Julia said earlier today that on their comeback party, the ladies will go crazy for each track on the album, only imagining Julia trying to rap along with Emelia for [The Best]. For sure, Emelia and Carolina have done great on the songs. Emelia even raps a bit for the radio, stopping abruptly to tell listeners to buy the album to hear the rest – best seller ever. Since Hannah did the rap, she gets to recommend a song next; she recommends [I Still Want You], a song that Park Hyekyung and Hannah wrote together, a song she recommends because of the strong vocals in it.

The question comes to Hannah, and she first only gives out the sound ‘um…’ that makes her laugh because the others imitate her.

“I think I would recommend the song [Girls Power],” Hannah ends up answering, nodding when seeing Julia nod her head right next to her, “Because it is the title track and the focus on the album and concept, and it is personally a favourite song for me because of many things. It’s a song for women.”

“To let our listeners know exactly what title track we are talking about, here is the number one song; [Girls Power],” K.Will smoothly says and the music begins playing. Right away he starts moving his hands and nodding his head. Now it is friendly talk between them, with the music playing for the radio. “This is a super great song, really, just listening to your voices gives me the chills,” he compliments the ladies.

Hannah is smiling at him, being friendly while the others are doing the talking; they talk only about 5 Pieces’ album. He picks up the signed album he received when the ladies arrived earlier and starts asking questions that pretty much are curiousness of a colleague. Hannah glances next to her to look at her cell phone right by the table, sneaking with it, and she sees that Kyung Ho has texted ‘you are on the radio! I heard your voice! Nuna, fighting!’. She expected Jonghyun to have texted, just to be reminded that they talked earlier today when we was at the airport, going to China for his concert, so he isn’t listening. Actually, this is 5 Pieces’ first radio appearance in a while, and the first for this comeback. Smiling, Hannah leans towards Julia again, just to meet Carolina’s eyes and start lip-synching to their own song on the radio. Still, they have three segments left on this one-hour radio visit.

For an hour 5 Pieces promote themselves on the radio, making K.Will and the staff laughs several of times and K.Will openly says on the show at the end that he wants them to come visit many more times because they are just that fun to have there. Ending their time there, 5 Pieces take pictures with K.Will for the radio before heading off to the next thing on today’s schedule; pre-recording for tomorrow’s Music Core.

Half the night they record a dark and y performance of [Girls Power] without an audience, go home to sleep for a few hours before heading back to MBC to do [POWER UP] with an audience and the day passes by like a dream with a bunch of endless interviews where 5 Pieces are cheering, singing, laughing and promoting, they visit Park Kyunglim’s radio in the day to cheerfully bring up the mood with some radio chatting and some more promotion. Actually, 5 Pieces seems to bring smiles to every face they meet; their new concept has a really good vibe to it and for that 5 pieces can relax during promotions, really show that it is a fun pop track they promote this round and they just can’t stop smiling. This is how a comeback weekend should be like, with endless of promotions where they are asked the same questions, but for a comeback it is good questions; style, changes, music, choreography, who they have worked with and the typical album questions that 5 Pieces know fluently.

The music program Music Core hasn’t even started this afternoon until 5 Pieces has left. Their comeback performances are done here and they move over to SBS to pre-record tomorrow’s performance of [POWER UP] and do some more interviews.

Finishing at SBS after nine in the evening, there is only one thing on the ladies’ minds, and that is not sleep.

“LET’S GO PARTY, PEOPLE!” Maria is roaring walking through a corridor, already hearing loud music playing in the rented hall where 5 Pieces’ album release party is being held.

Or it is going to be there, because the night hasn’t started so it is calm in the hall at the moment, the music is loud and 5 Pieces warms up for the party with their dancers and the band before others might start arriving. Hannah is wearing silver rings and bracelets, an ivory coloured sheer crinkled gauze tunic with crochet detailing on the neck, sleeves and bottom; pretty and simple. She wears a long silver necklace with black details, over-the-knee socks in black and a pair of flat boots. It’s simple, it’s cool, and suited for the warm last hours of May.

The crew is having a blast, singing karaoke and drinking. Hannah is going from one alcoholic drink to one glass of water, back and forth while Maria is barely swallowing and just pouring down her drinks doing games with some of the others. It hasn’t even been an hour before the first person is sitting down in the corner looking sick.

An hour after arriving, Hannah is sitting by one of the tables and laughing in this giggly way with some of the girls in their crew when the tone of voices grows higher and lighter in greetings, and before she knows it SNSD’s Tiffany is dancing over to them, walking around greeting and congratulating the five ladies on their comeback.

Tiffany looks absolutely gorgeous in a yellow jacket and black dress, and she has Carolina next to her who is making that eye-smile not rest for a second and Tiffany is loudly greeting Hannah while giving her a light hug and brightly greeting everyone else around the table, giving one of the female dancers a hug too.

“You look absolutely stunning,” Tiffany says loudly in Hannah’s ear to be heard over the music. “I absolutely adore your hair; it looks so good at you.”

“Ah, you think? Carolina can’t stop touching it,” Hannah laughs and Tiffany joins in, throwing her hair over her shoulder to look over at Carolina before bending back down to Hannah.

“I’m not sure she has greeted you, but Taeyeon went to get a drink. Yoona is here too,” Tiffany tells her.

Hannah nods, liking that their friends are here to party and celebrate 5 Pieces’ album release. Tiffany gives her a nod to come along, and the hand held out for her gives Hannah no choice but to leave her table and go greet the others. Maria is heard in the hall, standing on the sofa with one of the male dancers and singing horribly to the karaoke and going wild the way Maria always does. Hannah, Tiffany and Carolina walk up to the bar to be met by smiling faces and Hannah is soon hugging more members of SNSD – Taeyeon, Yoona and Sunny – and the compliments about Hannah’s hair is the main topic at first. After the first minutes, when everyone have gotten a drink in hand, Hannah walks with Taeyeon and Yoona to sit by themselves, and the topic is simple; boyfriends. Yoona has a boyfriend, Hannah has a boyfriend, and Taeyeon has a secret boyfriend. A secret boyfriend means the public does not know of their relationship, and honestly Hannah hasn’t really known much about it because they just started to grow closer than just friends, but she is not surprised at all. But with Hannah and Yoona both being in public relationships, Hannah being the senior on this subject by a year (it is so sick the way they are talking about Hannah being the public relationship senior…), and they are constantly talking about the difference of their relationships.

“We barely meet now,” Yoona reveals, “Because we know the paparazzi are stalking us in hope to catch us together, so we’re just talking over the phone all the time.”

“Really?” Hannah leans closer. The three of them are sitting closely by themselves and almost talking in mouth about their own experiences. “Jonghyun wants to meet all the time.”

“Yeah, but I think Jonghyun doesn’t mind your pictures being taken either,” Taeyeon says, sitting on Yoona’s other side. “He is more open, is he not? And you two have been together for like three years already…”

Yoona nods and Hannah finds herself nodding in agreement too. The conversation goes on and on and it is actually fun to be talking to others who are basically in the same situation as Hannah. For a year she has been terrified for being caught on a date with Jonghyun or that people will find out he actually stays the night in her apartment at times, and talking about these things with two girls who kind of are in the same situation lets her know that there are so many celebrities going through the same thing. They talk about being asked about their relationships during interviews too. When SNSD made their comeback, the members were constantly asked about their boyfriends, at times just secretly being asked but it is still obvious who they want the answer to be about and Hannah is just pouting because she has not gotten those questions yet, and she tells them that she didn’t get many questions about her relationship during their [I Want a Man] promotions at the start of the year either.

Before they know it the hall has been filled up with managers, stylists, the American choreography team and teachers, some friends and who not who has been invited to the album release party. Normally when Koreans celebrate they all sit down for a drink, soju, and just talk, but when it comes to 5 Pieces they need a dance-floor and real drinks – and for Carolina and Maria they do not seem like they want to leave the karaoke. A few people has spotted Hannah and come up to their corner just to greet her, exchange a few words more or less before walking to someone else to dance, drink and sing karaoke, but Hannah stays talking with Yoona and Taeyeon as they can’t seem to stop having something to talk about.

“HANNAH! HANNAH!” a familiar voice is roaring while another is shouting for someone to lower the music. “HAS SOMEONE SEEN THIS REALLY CUTE, PINK HAIRED GIRL- HANNAH!”

Hannah is smiling and hurrying over to find her members shouting around in the hall and they all starts laughing when Hannah finds them. The music is turned down and of course, Maria’s voice was roaring because she had a microphone in hand. Hannah walks up next to Emelia, the rapper puts an arm around her shoulder and right away by the laziness in that arm can Hannah tell that Emelia has been drinking. Not much, but enough for an unsteady balance. It seems like all of her members are at least a little bit tipsy, and the leader who always is so crazy gets crazier with alcohol in her body and she is the highlight entertainment of the party.

“This party,” Maria starts saying when having everyone’s attention, “is to celebrate the album release called [Girls Power] – our fourth album. As 5 Pieces we have had some amazing days for this comeback weekend and we would want to thank every single person in this room for not just coming but for loving us so much.”

You can’t help but to laugh at Maria and most people in the room understand her jokes and they love this girl’s personality. Hannah is smiling too, and the ladies are starting to ramble up all the people they know have worked on their album, having not just a manager reminding them but even their producer is heard helping out. When the ladies starts to mention ALL of their dancers it is just so much laughter mixed with cheers as their male dancers cheers when hearing their name. It is the most hilarious speech ever and Hannah ends up sitting down on a chair behind her members and just making the most random hand motions with Yoona while her members are still talking and Carolina ends up sitting in her lap and asks why they have so much to say… The two girls quietly stand back up when the speech is finally coming to an end.

“We love you all! Let’s wish for a great promotion and have a blast night! CHEERS!” Emelia is the one finishing the cheer with a drink held up in the air; everyone follows her and starts drinking anew with the music turning up.

Hannah rushes to find Park Hyekyung, 5 Pieces’ song-writer and producer who works for SM but the ladies love to say he is their producer, as she had spotted him during the speech but hasn’t met him earlier tonight.

“Oppa!” Hannah laughs when seeing him.

The man she 99% of the time meets in the recording studio is actually at the party, and she is in such an enormous smile seeing him being out enjoying himself at a party, besides from that he is not talking brightly to everyone like the way he shines up seeing Hannah.

“Hi, pink bunny,” Park Hyekyung jokes and lightly hugs her. “Is that the new nickname for you?”

“I haven’t heard it in years it feels like,” Hannah laughs, actually surprised to hear someone else than a fan call her ‘bunny’ – a nickname she got around their debut. “But I did not expect to see you here, Oppa. Carolina said you had something else to do.”

Everyone at the agency knows that nights are Hyekyung’s magical time to make the great music he is known for, and the ladies both knows and understands that he is more of the kind who stays home than goes out to party. Which is why she looks super happy to have him there, because in the end he should get a lot of credit for not just the album but for 5 Pieces overall, as the genius he is. Hyekyung smiles at her comment, nodding at first but then shakes his head.

“There is no way I would miss this, she actually told you I wasn’t coming? I even texted you, Hannah, saying to save me from being taken to the dance-floor – which you failed because the second I entered, I had two guys dragging me over to dance. I have no idea of who they are.”

“Probably dancers; they are like Maria,” Hannah says and nods her head; she will take care of him. “Do you want something to drink?”

“What are you having?” Hyekyung asks while they go to the bar.

“Um… water,” Hannah answers.

Hyekyung nods and gets the bartender’s attention to order one glass of water and one drink. While waiting for his drink, Taeyeon comes up to them, to greet Hyekyung and start talking with them and they decide to head to some corner table to sit down; just that Hannah is pulled away by her manager to take some pictures with her members before everyone is getting too drunk. They take pictures as a group, they take pictures with their choreographers (the American team seems to be having a blast) and Hannah is just social being part of the main reason they are there at all.

The party continues, Hannah has been talking to this and that person, she has been dancing and she has now gone to drinking water because her manager told her to not drink too much because she is a girl who is taking painkillers daily.

Everyone is having a blast and Hannah is just telling one of the girls from the band that she is going to sit down for a bit – she keeps walking back and forth from being social to everyone there to sit by the corner with Hyekyung and Taeyeon. And just as she opens , letting one word out, someone is hugging her from behind while a man’s voice says something in her ear. Hannah has no time to know what this person says because all she knows is that her boyfriend is currently abroad for a concert and is not coming back until Monday, and that makes her basically lean away while turning around to stare at the person as if it is a ghost hugging the fright out of her.

“OH MY GOD!” Hannah burst out before screaming and wrapping her arms around FT Island’s big baby Minhwan, jumping in his arms and he is laughing with her. “It’s been like ages!”

“I know! Look at that hair,” Minhwan laughs, touching her pink hair and Hannah can just laugh in agreement.

Being born in 1992, 5 Pieces and Minhwan kind of like started off their friendship with a connection because they are all born the same year. It is always like that. If you are born the same year, you have a special connection, and Minhwan is probably the most adorable connection to Hannah as they are the youngest in their groups and when 5 Pieces debuted he and Hannah always took pictures together where they did the same faces.

She is so happy Minhwan is there, just to see him makes it no surprise to see Honggi show up as well, and with Honggi seeing Hannah hug Minhwan again, the two youngest jumping in excitement to meet after not seeing each other in a long time, Honggi just asks if he is not getting a hug too, and whatever happened in the past it is weird to hug one person and not the other; Hannah hugs him.

Not having Jonghyun there makes her nervous to see Honggi. She doesn’t know what it is, but something in her stomach just misses to have Jonghyun there with her, but she continues to smile and has to start explaining why she is not drinking like everyone else. Telling it once to Honggi, Minhwan wants her to repeat it and Seunghyun shows up and he asks the same thing. It’s a good thing they are at a party, because somehow it gets super fun to be talking to Minhwan. He tells her what he has been up to and they catches up with everything, the time just flies and Honggi joins them after going around being social and before Hannah knows it, she is sitting down laughing with the first person she kissed, the same person who she has punched and fought with, who she has such a history with that her mood can never stay just one way around him.

“Last time we met,” Hannah says, completely turned to Honggi now when Minhwan has gotten up to go talk to Julia by the bar.

Honggi nods. “We went out for a drink,” he remembers, and leans closer to tell in her ear above the music; “Jonghyun came and you two left.”

Emelia and Julia had gone out for a drink with Honggi and CN Blue’s Jonghyun, and Hannah was bored waiting for Jonghyun’s radio to end that she had come along to just kill time. Hannah nods at his words. “At that time, you told me you want to re-connect. You have only texted me once, and that was at M Countdown.”

Though she is looking completely serious and curious as to why he said he want to re-connect, to be good friends again, to why he hasn’t tried to re-connect at all, Honggi is smiling at her.

“Are you sad I didn’t do more?” he teases.

“No,” Hannah grimaces and though his face says he is teasing her she does not like it. “Don’t joke like that.”

“You’re too serious, Hannah,” Honggi just smiles, and he keeps that smile at her. “You can’t help but to smile when this face is right in front of you; I’m too cute, aren’t I?”

And it’s true, just that makes her smile and Hannah shakes her head while smiling.

“I’m taking it slow with you,” Honggi then admits, “You’re moody when you are making a comeback, and you all keep saying you are terrified this round; I’ll contact you more often once your comeback weekend is done, okay?”

“Text me tomorrow then,” Hannah says, pointing at him as if he has to promise and Honggi chuckles, a manly chuckle with a cute face.

“I’m in Japan tomorrow, but I’ll definitely call you when I can,” Honggi answers. If she had been single, this would sound like flirting, and Hannah isn’t sure if it can be misunderstood as flirting because she for sure can’t stop smiling, but definitely she is not flirting. And they keep talking with smiles and Hannah giggles.

“Baby!”

No one else but Maria falls over Hannah so the pink haired girl leans towards Honggi, laughing and the leader is drunk, patting Honggi on the cheek while suffocating Hannah underneath her.

“You, pretty little boy Lee Honggi, should keep your hands away from our baby-”

“Maria,” Hannah whines, pulling her friend up to sit next to her instead but Maria is still leaning over her.

“No, no, I need to tell you,” Maria is talking to Honggi, and he just nods and smiles because he knows she is drunk and Hannah just shakes her head at Honggi, telling him to not listen. “Get a drink, and stop sitting here you lazy vocalist; there is a karaoke machine across the floor and a room to dance on.”

“You’re drunk.”

Maria gets up to start moving her hands for them to come along. “I challenge you, pretty little boy, on karaoke.”

A challenge, of course Honggi smiles and stands up. “Do you dare to face me?” he asks her, looking like this is the best part of the party.

“I dare to stand on international stages in front of my future husbands; I dare facing you, pretty little boy.”

“Don’t call me little,” Honggi says, but he laughs following Maria and grabs Hannah’s arm for her to come along. Hannah is the only one not knowing the challenge isn’t just about karaoke, it’s about Hannah too. Honggi knows like every single person knowing 5 Pieces that Hannah is called 5 Pieces’ baby for a reason: Maria does not like Hannah sitting and having fun talking with her ex-boyfriend while her current boyfriend is working abroad. Honggi understands it, while Hannah like always do not understand a thing; she just sees two vocalists facing each other off with the karaoke machine.

But the two of them going insane by the karaoke is dreadful. Maria ends up lying down in a sofa, singing or screaming and Hannah hear someone ask if Maria even knows if she is lying down and not standing up, and Honggi is just challenging her song after song.

It’s three in the morning when Hannah is sitting bored outside the hall, to get some fresh air and with cell phone at hand. She would’ve had more fun if Jonghyun was here. Probably; she is just waiting for everyone to start head home. Some have left, but most of them are still having a blast inside, and Hannah is just getting tired because they still have Inkigayo during the day.

She looks to the side when hearing the door open, and she smiles weakly seeing Park Hyekyung come out, wearing jeans, t-shirt and a thin stylish blazer. He is good-looking and once again she wonders why he doesn’t have a girlfriend, just to be reminded that he rather stays home than goes out. Hyekyung nods in a greeting seeing her being there alone, and without a word he leans against the wall standing next to her, looking at the empty street before them.

“Are you out to take some air?” Hannah wonders, glancing at their producer.

“Mm, I said to those inside that I’m heading home,” Hyekyung answers and sighs, looking like he will push himself away from the wall but hesitates. “Are you waiting to leave?”

She pouts at him. “Maria can stay here until we have to go work,” Hannah answers, not wanting to stay for some more hours just to wait for a ride home.

“Come with me then, I can give you a ride,” Hyekyung answers, nodding down the road.

“Are you even capable of driving?” Hannah frowns.

Hyekyung bounces off the wall and turns around, a hand in his jeans pocket and shrugs his shoulder. “I didn’t drink that much. I can walk a straight line all the way to the car if you want. Come on, you’ll be home and in bed asleep before they are even thinking of leaving,” Hyekyung says and Hannah smiles.

“Probably true,” she sighs and leaves the wall to go with him. “I don’t think I have ever seen you drive before, though.”

“It’s nothing special, just me driving a car,” Hyekyung jokes. “It’s not as fancy as when your boyfriend drives you around though.”

She laughs at his joke, agreeing with him and remembering one time when Jonghyun had picked her up from a party, and they had stopped by to buy a bag of chips for her. The best boyfriend indeed. Hyekyung laughs when they get in his car, seeing the longing face-expression she has and Hannah just smiles at him, knowing it is obvious she misses her boyfriend.

“Don’t you want a girlfriend, Oppa?” Hannah asks. He drives off softly.

“Sure… Someone to call after midnight when I finish working, someone to have fights with and make up because I miss her, someone to call cute names like Butterfly…” Hyekyung says but starts laughing at Hannah burst out in a laugh at his ‘butterfly’ nickname as she realises he is just making fun of her own relationship.

“That is so mean!” Hannah says but she laughs with her head back at it so it is obvious it isn’t really that mean after all.

“But you two are cute, that’s for sure,” Hyekyung chuckles, giving her a glance. “Yes, it would be fun to have a girlfriend, but you know me; I’m married to my work.”

“Mm… I think Jonghyun and I are that too. He texts me song lyrics at times, and he always wants to know what I am writing, and I think it’s just … yeah…”

“Jonghyun has always been focused on music though,” Hyekyung says, “He was so energetic when I showed him [Butterfly], he had so many ideas of his own, as if you’re like his muse.”

Hannah smiles at him. [Butterfly] is a song Hyekyung wrote for Hannah, one of her solo singles, and he wrote it after hearing Jonghyun call Hannah ‘nabi/butterfly’. It is a great song and Hyekyung is a person who understands 5 Pieces in a way that he can put down in lyrics and music. It’s amazing how his brain works.

One thing leads to another. Talking about music, it goes crazy between these two and soon they are heading to Hyekyung’s apartment to continue the conversation with him showing her some tracks. Hannah has never been in his apartment, and she is not surprised that it is a small apartment with a bathroom, kitchen, hall and living-room with a bed and a lot of recording equipment. There is so many locks on his door that he could be a millionaire keeping all his money in there, but he owns something worth that much; music belonging to SM Entertainment. As soon as they enter he offers her something to drink. Going from alcohol to water to water, and with a bottle of water at hand Hannah secretly looks around in the apartment while Hyekyung starts to turn on his equipment.

“You actually live here alone?” Hannah wonders, not seeing dust anywhere. Besides from having some clothes and a bunch of papers lying around, it’s surprisingly clean. Some dirty dishes in the sink, maybe from breakfast or something, but it is still surprisingly clean in this small apartment.

“Mm… I banned Pete for coming here because he just puts cups of coffee all around the place,” Hyekyung says while his eyes are stuck on his computer screen.

“Oppa, you do know that the recording-studio is always covered in coffee cups, right?” Hannah asks and comes to sit down next to him on a chair that he took out for her. He is a real producer; real equipment, much more complicated than the one Carolina has and Hannah doesn’t even ask what all of it is since she knows she will not understand a thing of the words he will say.

He plays a lot of music for her, just the instrumental versions of some and then he has added lyrics to a few and the talk is the same as it is in the recording-studio. Hannah doesn’t know much about what is what in music, she doesn’t know the details, but she loves music and she has been given award for writing the most touching song of the century, and Hyekyung knows she loves to write. They are two nerds.

“Oh, I like this one,” Hannah points at the screen when he plays an instrumental for her.

“Yeah, it’s one I did recently, but I can’t find out what to write for it. I keep thinking it is a love song, but then I think it is a good party song and I get confused. You know that confusion you get?”

They end up working on the song. Hyekyung is bouncing with his hand while Hannah is standing up, singing something random. It’s crazy, and the moment they find a few words that can fit the song, the ideas just flows right through them. Especially for Hannah, who claps her hands and then grabs a paper and pen and starts writing down. She loves to make music with Hyekyung, she isn’t all that insecure of being herself or showing what she comes up with because he is pretty much her teacher and classmate in the lesson of music. She comes up with the raw lyrics, at least most parts of it, and Hyekyung is growing excited when she begins singing a part for him.

“Oh Jesus that’s glorious,” he says.

They are halfway done when Hannah’s phone starts ringing. Manager Lim wants to know where she is. Hannah had texted them all that she is getting a ride home from Hyekyung; not did she expect to have a blast making music for three hours, so the others came home and she is not there. Meaning Manager Lim comes to get her to take her home for a quick shower and head to the saloon to begin Sunday’s promotions.

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Headline 30th: 5 Pieces Wins Music Bank With [Girls Power]

Headline 30th: 5 Pieces Reveals They Were Terrified For This Comeback + More During Charming Guest Appearance On Radio

 

Headline 31st: Critics Comment On 5 Pieces’ Comeback As “Fun, Humorous, Entertaining & Flawless”

Headline 31st: Park Kyunglim Can’t Stop Praising 5 Pieces During Their Radio Visit

Headline 31st: 5 Pieces Unrecognizable In y & Feminine Comeback Stage On Music Core

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X. devonalias

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min2key
#1
Chapter 55: enjoyed reading this.. and will surely wait for the next to come..
min2key
#2
Chapter 46: I don't know what to comment anymore but what I want to say is every time I read an update of this is I always think "how long am I going to wait to read the next one?" "I can't wait for the next update to come" "I hope soon". Then I keep on repeating reading this... Anyways keep it up authornim!
min2key
#3
Chapter 35: i hope at this part 10 of the story jonghyun and hannah get engage or something kkk

anyways looking forward for more updates to come ^^

fighting! :)
min2key
#4
Chapter 22: thanks for the update authornim!

:)
min2key
#5
Chapter 18: way to go hannah! marking territory hahahah

more jonghyun hannah interaction please...

thanks for updating authornim! fighting! ^^
SuperShannon
#6
Hello long time no see, could you make a story of 5Pieces biography pretty please??!!!
Plus could you keep uploading more chapters on Youngest of Pieces: Girls Power please!!!???
min2key
#7
Chapter 11: 4 updates thank you authornim! :)

more to come please.

fighting! ^^
SuperShannon
#8
Please upload more chapters soon ok?
min2key
#9
Chapter 4: the surprise visit jonghyun made was romantic. ^^

can't wait for the next updates...

more hannah and jonghyun moments please!

fighting! :)
min2key
#10
Chapter 2: another story to wait for... really thank you for this. ^^