No one ever really paid any attention to a nugu like her.

She didn’t mind that much, not really.She had had a great debut. Well, as great of a debut you could have while being constantly compared to another artist. The hurtful comments made about her didn’t bother her that much, after all, she and Jieun had been friends ever since they met as trainees so long ago. She wasn’t sure if they were still friends anymore, considering it had been almost two years since their last conversation.

Yonghwa had naturally been a great duet partner for her. They were friends, shared similar interests, and had known each other since they were children. Plus, he had a large fanbase which had helped her popularity soar more than it could have ever had if she had done so all on her own.

But like all good things, it came to an end all too soon.

She had been quickly forgotten by the public after the debut of her labelmates AOA. She had been happy for them, considering that she was initially supposed to debut as a part the group instead of as a solo artist. But that was another story for another time.

After the debut of AOA, FNC had put all their effort into making the group soar. Of course, this meant that they had practically shoved her into the background, only compensating for it by booking her on radio shows and giving her a closet-sized workroom to write songs in. Still, she was happy because she hadn’t gotten kicked out of the company. Yet.

Her saving grace came in the form of Ryeowook-oppa, who had invited her to become a regular  guest of Sukira. Her agency had readily accepted the offer and, before she could fully understand what was happening, she was casted as a regular guest on two other radio shows. She enjoyed it for the most part, having met some great people during her run on the shows. But like everything she did, it came to an end also.

They scheduled her for another comeback, after almost a year-long hiatus. Unlike the mellow songs she felt the most comfortable singing, Pretty Boy was an upbeat track with lyrics that made her cringe at the cheesiness of it all. They had dyed her hair red, stuffed her in colorful, whimsical outfits, and painted her nails with more colors that the rainbow had in it. She looked and felt ridiculous, and Jongin had no trouble pointing that out to her.

Kim Jongin, that poor soul. The two had known each other for years, having been introduced to each other via Jinki. Despite the elder’s determination to get the two to date, they never stepped outside the boundary of friendship, something they both appreciated and never questioned. Not many knew of their friendship, which was fine because she didn’t want anyone knowing about it anyway, until her agency found out because Hongki had such a big mouth on him and never knew when to shut up. When they found out, they, of course, wanted her to reveal her friendship with him and the rest of EXO (which was nonexistent because she really only knew Jongin, Sehun, and Chanyeol anyway) so they booked her on a show and, behold, the MCs questioned her friendship with the almighty Kai. Not one to lie, she said that yes, they were friends (true), yes, he had introduced her to the rest of EXO (half-truth since she had never personally met the M members), and that no, they don’t meet in private (total lie, since she had gone out for drinks with Jongin and Chanyeol the night before). Like a charm, that interview led to her name being one of the top searches on Naver. Unfortunately, Jongin had gotten upset at her for using their friendship for her personal gain and stopped talking to her for a while.

She went on another hiatus after that, this one lasting until September of that year. The news of her comeback was supposed to be a joyous one (she supposed, since most of her fans had left her during the hiatus) since it was announced on her birthday, but was overshadowed by the loss of Eunbi and Rise. Like others, she was saddened by the news too. But because she didn’t actually know the girls personally, the sadness only lasted for a couple of days before she had pretty much gotten over it in face of the lengthy preparations for her comeback.

Her comeback had . Majorly. Again, she had been stuck singing some cheesy love song in a pitch that was too high for her to showcase any of her talent. Not only that, her stylists dressed her up like some eighty year old grandmother and she had to sing on stage strumming a guitar that was completely useless since there wasn’t even a guitar in the backtrack. All in all, the only thing she got out of the comeback was a stupid orange haircut, one variety show appearance, and guest starring on radio shows that she was already a member of.

It wasn’t all that surprising to her when Han Seungho called her into his office to tell her that, unfortunately, they had to let her go because even though they had tried to garner her some success, they were putting too much money into her and were receiving no profit. In other words, they didn’t want to keep wasting money on her when they could spend that money elsewhere, like debuting another girl group or giving one of their more successful artists another comeback.

She didn’t cry nor did she try to convince her CEO otherwise. Instead, she silently packed up her workroom, said goodbye to her now former labelmates, and called her mother and told her that it was over and she needed a place to stay until she could find another job, one that was, preferably, not in the entertainment industry.

Coming back home had been hard. Not physically demanding since she didn’t have much to move out in the first place and her parents lived in Seoul so it wasn’t too long of a drive. But it had been emotionally hard on her because she had to face the fact that the dream she had given up her childhood for was over and she had failed. She was a failure. And that was the hardest thing of all.

Standing on the roof of the building, she looked down at the street below. Twenty stories, high enough to see all of Seoul and high enough that if she fell, the impact would kill her almost immediately. It was dark now, the sun having set about an hour before and she estimated that, by now, her parents had come home from work and found her letter. It pained her to think of her poor mother, frantically calling everyone she knew to try and see if anyone had any idea where she had gone. She doubted it, because the building she chose was discreet and no one knew about it other than herself and-

“Chanyeol.”

No one ever really paid any attention to a nugu like her, but maybe that wasn’t so bad after all.

(Juniel did die on the rooftop of that building, the only witness being Park Chanyeol. But in her absence left Choi Junhee, who eventually went on to become a counselor, sharing her story with teenagers to help them realize that just because one of your dreams doesn’t come true, there is still a place in the world for you. All you have to do is move forward with life and find who you are truly meant to be.

She also ended up marrying Chanyeol, becoming not only a wife, but a mother to two adorable children and one overgrown brat. But that’s another story for another time.)

*Nugu, in the context of this particular story, is a derogatory term for someone who is unknown in the entertainment industry. It's literal transation is "who?"