jimin (bts) & kei (lovelyz)

One, two, step. 

One, two, slide.

One, two, step, slide, step.

Sweat is trickling down the dancer's forehead, making it's way to the bridge of his nose. He wipes it, because it tingles against his warm skin. He continues the choreography without a hitch, actually amazed at how fast he learned it considering it was only taught about an hour ago or so to him. He dances alone in the beige-walled room, in front of a mirror that occupies a whole wall.

The music comes to a stop and a figure joins him in his reflection.

"Good job, Jimin." the dance instructor says. "At this rate, you're going to debut in no time."

Park Jimin smiles, cautious in getting his hopes up.

She slides to the side, throws her hands in the air, does a wave before scuttling over to the next position.

She dances, along with twenty other girls, and the room is stuffy with all those bodies but she doesn't give up nor falters because she's right in front of the judge's eyes and she cannot screw this up, considering this might as well be her last chance as she had skipped school for this audition.

She is aware of the stares she's receiving from the three people in front of her but she acts as if it's no big deal. She continues to dance to the music - it's Icona Pop - and she makes a mistake by stepping to the right instead of left, but she covers it up quickly and gives away no hint of expression towards it.

The music stops and everyone is sent out.

When the judges come out later, the two leave and they all bow, one stays and announces the names of the lucky ones who'll be given the grand chance of training under Woollim.

"Kim Jiyeon."

She hears her name and feels like her dreams are finally coming true.

Jimin doesn't leave early again today even though they specifically told him to go to the dorms around 10 so that he could rest up for tomorrow' debut. Jimin couldn't rest, so he left the dorm around two in the morning to go to the convenience store next door for something to eat considering there wasn't anything edible in their refrigerator. 

The store's sign illuminates the street in colors of red, yellow, white and blue.

Jimin walks towards it like a fly entrance by light.

He catches sight of a girl from the corner of his eye, she's extending her arm but he's the first one who gets a hold of the handle. He opens it, then wider, and gestures for her to go in first.

She bows at him, mumbles something that was probably a thank you, and goes in the store with him trailing behind.

Jiyeon needs caffeine, lots of it. Since the coffee machine in the practice room decided to stop working when she needed it most, she had to walk three blocks to get to this store. At two in the morning, this was the only one open in the neighborhood by far.

She buys a cup of warm coffee from the counter and it stung her tongue the first time, but she sips it quicker than she should've had. She buys another, already feeling the energy kick in her veins and bloodstream.  She takes a seat in one of the stools waiting for it to cool down.

"If they keep this training regime up - I - God, I can't even think about what'll happen to me." frustrated, she lets out a small, impish whimper before holding her face to her hands. "But I can't quit, obviously not. Because what good will it do? I - just - ugh! I just need to two more years. Or perhaps, even just one and I can be like my sunbaes." 

Jiyeon has had too much already and it's only been a year, apparently she's had it too much because she doesn't realize she's talking to herself and someone had clearly heard it.

From the corner of her eye, two seats ahead, that guy who opened the door for her is looking. 

Jiyeon whispers curses to herself, closes her eyes and slowly slides off the stool with the coffee in hand.

"I'm such an embarrassment," She walks out of the store, looking the other way when she passes the window. 

After their stage, which had garnered a huge round of applause from the audience. Jimin collapses on the sofa and gets teary-eyed unlike Taehyung and Hoseok, or rather, V and J-Hope, who are crying as they take out their phones and call their parents. Jungkook is beside him, partially passed out maybe, and the thought of calling home hadn't even crossed his mind. 

Sighing, he stands up to take his phone from their manager and calls his mom, then his dad.

"I did it. I finally did it," was all he said.

Now, everyone was going to know their names, their group, Bangtan Sonyeondan. 

With more hard work, they won't even have to introduce themselves anymore. 

Jiyeon wakes up due to the squealing, but she's thankful as to how it's free period and no teacher is in-charge. She sees the girls flock over to the front, their heads raised up to the television screen above their blackboard. 

She turns to her seatmate.

"It's a new group. Bulletproof Boys or something." she just says.

Jiyeon turns back to the screen and squints her eyes. It was their debut performance as said by the logo on the upper left corner. She sat up straight and decided to watch it, might as well since they were pretty slick dancers. 

"Omo, omo! Guys, it's here! He's gonna -"

The room is filled with shrieks and screams and Jiyeon has to cover her ears while the other girls who are in no way interested in idols curs above the noise that is more likely made by dolphins than girls. 

"He just flashed his abs, you wrenches! It's no big-"

They squeal again, ignoring those around them, and Jiyeon rolls her eyes, still covering her ears. She looks up at the screen, or more like glares at it now, and sees a very familiar face lifting his shirt up. 

It's been a month and he's been to four cities so far, performing and recording and doing all these interviews. People knew him the most, and everyone in the group knew it was because of his part in their dance where he kills all those who watch it with just a lift of the shirt. 

They aren't that popular, so when Jimin complains about having no more ramyun, they just tell him to go and buy some. 

"Just be careful, and while you're at it, include some for us." Seokjin hands him money, smiling while the others nod in agreement behind him.

He looks down at the bills in his hands, scratching the back of his head with the other. "I - why me? And with this money, we can buy enough ramyun to feed an army -"

"Just go," they push him out the door and into the cold night. The streets are deserted and it's too cold for anyone to be out at this hour anyway, or at least in this part of the city. The street lamp beside their dorm flicker on and off, and shadows in the distance walk the other way. He hopes he won't encounter trouble during his short walk to the store.

But of course, he does anyway.

"Ah - ahjussi, I'm telling you I don't have money with me!"

"Yah, you wrench, you better shut your mouth and just hand over your wallet! You disrespectful piece of -"

A third voice joins the other two in the dead of the night, and the speaker is already walking to them, more than ready to jump in. "Chan-sulgolae! Stop that." 

Her eyes fall on the poor boy he has trapped against the wall with no way out. It's too dark to make out faces, but she's about a hundred percent sure his face is screaming terror right now. 

"Chan-sulgolae, just go home." she steps forward and pushes the man away from the boy with one hand, giving him a stern look. "Your wife must be looking for you, go, go!" she says, shooing him. The man walks the other way after saying a string of curses that is both directed at her and at the boy, occasionally stumbling over his own feet as he did so.  

Jiyeon turns to the boy, only to see his face clearly now as he steps out of the shadows and under the light of one of the street lamps. She feels herself warm up, because she recognizes him.

And he obviously recognizes her. 

"You -"

"You should be careful." she finds herself saying, sterny at that. It was the same tone she used on that drunkard. "That was  Chan-sulgolae, literally Chan-drunkard. That old man turns every teen he comes across a prey. He's a neighborhood drunkard, and you should've known better. You're an idol, you could've gotten yourself in big trouble."

"I - I didn't know about him." he seems flustered, but more embarrassed than anything else. "I -"

"Of course, you stay indoors more rather than out."

"He called me a 'wrench'."

Jiyeon tries not to smile. "It's dark, maybe the way you shrieked made him thought you were a girl."

"Hey!"

"And your height, oh wow, you're shorter in real life than in TV."  

"Now that's just -"

"I'm Kim Jiyeon," she outstretches a hand. "But my stage name will be 'Kei'. I hope you'll remember me."

The backstage is like a hive, with everyone buzzing and busy as they tend to what they needed to tend to and do what they had to do. After their rehearsal, the rest of s go straight back to their changing room to rest up for the live show which is in an hour. 

Jungkook stays a while, wanting to watch other idols perform but Jimin knows what he's up to and he stays by his side to ruin the fun. 

"You can just go," Jungkook tries one more time, but fails desperately at pushing Park Jimin away. He maybe taller but this hyung was surely stronger than him in ways he didn't know. "I really don't want you to be here."

Jimin swats his hands away before snorting at the younger boy. "Oh come on, we can watch together you know. I kinda like their song. Candy jelly love ~" he breaks out and hums a familiar tune to Jungkook's ears.

"I'm not - I - I'm not here for them!"

"Yeah, sure you're not."

"I -"

Jungkook is cut short by a female staffing yelling: "Lovelyz! Places on the stage now, please!"

Jimin nudges the younger one by the sides as he sees a group of girls all doning school uniforms walk towards the stage beside them."Hey, Jungkook! It's Lovelyz! You like them, right?" he says in a very loud and annoying voice. 

Jungkook glares at him but is unable to do further more than that, because he immediately drops to a ninety degree bow upon the girls passing by them. "Do you best. Fi - fighting!" he says this to everyone, but his eyes are trained to the one with the ponytail, the one grinning at him from ear to ear. "I - err -"

"Thank you, sunbae." she's a year younger than him, but they're basically the same height. Jungkook looks away, shy all of a sudden.

Beside him, Jimin is smiling; it's soft and subtle and aimed at the one with bangs and a smirk on her face. "Hey, Jiyeon."

"I keep telling you it's Kei."

Jimin shakes his head.

She rolls her eyes at him. "Fine, whatever." 

They look at each other for a second longer, exchanging smiles and memorie of nights they spent eating ramen and drinking coffee in that convenience store by his dorm; with him wearing all kinds of disguises and Jiyeon telling him all kinds of things. 

The rest of the girls are calling her, and she smiles at him one last time.

"Hi, Jimin."