Chapter 11: The Big Brother

“Wanna eat first, then practice?”

“Yes. What are we eating?”

“Whatever you want. Not spicy.”

They ate home-style food at a restaurant right in front of the agency building, then threw themselves into practice again until they lost track of time.

Of course, only Jun threw himself into it. Ye-jun yawned now and then, got distracted, and let his eyes wander.

“My tone isn’t that good, so I don’t know how to bring this part to life.”

“Who said your voice is shit?”

“I didn’t say shit.”

“No, who said it was bad? You just say whatever the f*ck you want. Does your brain not process before it comes out your mouth? Guess your thoughts take the express lane straight to your snout.”

When his little brother looked depressed, Ye-jun faithfully played the role of a good older brother, even going overboard to cheer him up.

When the clock passed eleven, Ye-jun stood and said it was time to go.

Jun still looked a little disappointed, so Ye-jun heaped on the biggest praise he could manage.

“Compare yourself to five hours ago. Even you have to admit you improved a lot. If I were a composer, I’d clap and ask how you got this good. With the soles of my feet.”

Ye-jun kept running his mouth with nonsense until Jun finally started packing, and only then did he close his pen cap in satisfaction.

Honestly, he wanted to go home more than he wanted to comfort Jun.

He fetched his phone from where it had flown off and suddenly remembered something, digging through his pocket.

“What good is it if your throat won’t come out when you actually record? You have to let it rest too.”

What came out of his pocket was a green throat lozenge.

“Open your mouth. Quick.”

Jun opened his mouth a little, confused.

Ye-jun pushed the lozenge into his open mouth and took one himself.

“You eat these too, hyung? That’s unexpected.”

“Yeah.”

Jun asked while rolling the lozenge around his mouth, and Ye-jun nodded.

To be honest, he had tried one once before and hated the scratchy feeling in his throat, so he never ate them.

Buying it at the convenience store after dinner earlier had just been an impulse.

If 800 won could take care of your throat, how cheap was that?

Jun had a hard time producing sound from his throat, and his throat got damaged quickly.

So Ye-jun had bought one just because he saw it.

“Ji-gu, you’re up.”

Ye-jun, an only son, had always dreamed of having a younger brother.

That was also why he cared for Jun more than the other members.

For one thing, the others didn’t feel like younger brothers by Ye-jun’s standards.

Part of it was that Ye-jun himself didn’t act his age, but the other three especially seemed like adults who had been through everything.

I’m the one who’s lived thirty-six years, so why do they feel older?

Ye-jun rested his chin on the recording studio table and watched Ji-gu nod inside the booth.

“Can’t you use your chest voice there?”

“It comes out, but it’s a little shaky.”

“If it’s shaky, are you not going to sing? You have to go for it no matter what. Again.”

“Yes.”

Is that guy really thirty-six?

Even under the composer’s shouting because he wanted his song recorded at the highest quality, Ji-gu calmly adjusted his headphones without looking discouraged.

Ye-jun shook his head.

The composer for this title track was famous for forcing recordings for hours if something didn’t perfectly satisfy him.

“Next.”

Ji-gu, who usually got an okay after only a few takes, came out after singing one line of his part for twenty minutes.

The high notes must have been too much for him, because he kept coughing.

Ye-jun shoved the whole bag of throat lozenges left over from yesterday into Ha-hyeon’s hand as Ha-hyeon patted Ji-gu’s back.

“Jun, you’re up.”

Jun, called third, became the composer’s sacrificial lamb.

“How can you not sing one easy part perfectly? Again.”

Again. Do it again.

The word “again” echoed through the recording studio more than fifty times.

After being glared at nonstop and left completely drained, Jun was finally released from the booth.

Like someone who had been trapped against his will, he shot out of the recording booth as if he had survived.

“Oh, man…”

“You improved a lot, though?”

As soon as he came out, Hwi-young smiled and praised him.

Ha-hyeon nodded in agreement.

“It sounds much better than yesterday morning.”

“We still have five more songs to record.”

“But you got past the big one.”

“The title track is the hardest. Since you sang this well, the other tracks will come faster.”

“You think so?”

Jun, who seemed to have forgotten he’d ever been discouraged, perked up right away at his hyungs’ few words of comfort and smiled happily.

Having his turn over seemed to release all his tension.

“Ha-hyeon, you’re up.”

Ha-hyeon, fourth, also got scolded quite a bit before finally getting an okay.

Last was Ye-jun, and he walked naturally into the recording booth before the composer even called him.

He finished recording each part cleanly in three takes.

After ten years, spitting rap was easier than spending money.

“Ye-jun, did you practice? You’re good.”

It was the first compliment that had echoed through the recording studio all day.

Ye-jun nodded.

How much had he suffered in his life before last, trying to sing the way this composer wanted?

Too strong, no. With emotion, no. Too weak, no power…

Ye-jun still couldn’t forget the day he had stood in the recording booth for an hour and a half.

“Everyone worked hard today.”

The recording had started early in the morning, but it ended after four.

Everyone was exhausted and said they were going back to the dorm to sleep, skipping a late lunch.

Ye-jun, the only one of the five still in decent shape, opened a mobile game with a healthy glow on his face unlike the others.

While Ye-jun waited for the game screen to load, the members coldly left first.

Only Jun stayed behind to unwrap the throat lozenge Ha-hyeon had given him.

“Ah, I want some fresh air.”

“A drive?”

Ye-jun, who had somehow heard Jun muttering to himself, asked back.

At the same time, he thought of his car, parked safely at his family home.

He had bought one before appearing on Survival ID.

He had gotten his license as soon as he turned twenty, planning to drive his friends around with artistic driving skills.

But he got carsick on long rides and didn’t enjoy driving itself, so after a few drives he hadn’t driven in a long time.

“I was just saying it. I feel suffocated.”

“Yeah?”

Ye-jun thought for a moment. Exactly five seconds.

It was annoying, and a long drive would make him carsick again.

Ye-jun, who cut out things he didn’t want to do without even thinking twice, soon moved his mouth differently from what his head was thinking.

“We can just do it.”

Ye-jun was dumbfounded at himself as he spewed nonsense his brain had not agreed to.

I should just go and sleep more.

Even though he already knew the choreography perfectly, dance practice from tomorrow was scheduled tight.

“Hyung, do you have a car too?”

Jun was perceptive.

No matter how suffocated he felt, he would never ask their manager hyung to take him on a drive.

When Ye-jun said they could do it, Jun’s eyes lit up.

Faced with that slightly hopeful expression, Ye-jun eventually smiled as if he had no choice and shrugged.

“Of course I do.”

It was a car that made other cars on the road automatically yield when he drove it, though he hadn’t had many chances to drive it freely.

Ye-jun texted someone he hadn’t contacted in a while.

[Please bring my car to our agency parking lot. Leave the keys with the lobby staff.]

Ye-jun thought a car was pride.

Kids his age from the same neighborhood drove foreign cars in different colors Monday through Sunday.

Because of guys who collected cars worth hundreds of millions like figurines, he had impulsively bought a limited edition released for a brand’s 100th anniversary, one of only a few in the country, at twenty-three.

“It looks really expensive.”

It was a car that didn’t fit this shabby company building parking lot.

Just looking at it, it was clearly foreign and different from ordinary cars on the street.

The luxurious black body gleamed.

It was a plain, inconspicuous color, yet strangely flashy.

“It is expensive. Sell this and you could buy a house.”

“I think you could.”

Jun was a complete novice about cars, but just looking at Ye-jun’s car, he thought it seemed worth about 100 million won.

He splurged 30 million won on games too, so his family must really have a lot of money.

Jun hesitantly put his hand on the car, which looked too expensive even to touch the handle, then turned to Ye-jun.

“Hyung. Open this for me.”

“Don’t you have hands?”

“What if I scratch it?”

“What’s going to get scratched when you’re opening a door? Just open it and slam it shut. Do I look like someone who’d make you pay for breaking one door? Huh?”

Jun, who had said one thing and ended up being interrogated by Ye-jun, shook his head hard.

If one door got smashed, it seemed like it would cost several million won…?

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