Chapter 7: An Unexpected Empty Space

After the concert ended, the time came to start preparing for their comeback in earnest. They had already received the title track and choreography, and starting next week there would be recording and album jacket shoots. The title track, received from a famous composer, was about the one year they had run together.

“Are we shooting overseas?”

“Just looking at the photos is enough.”

The music video location was set overseas. It was a place with a stunning view of green fields and a blue sky right behind them. Flipping through the photos, the members gasped and said they wanted to go there soon. Yejun just nodded with a blank expression.

“It’s fine here.”

In reality, it was as green and clear as the photos, but the important thing was that once you went there, it felt like hell itself. It was a high-altitude region, so breathing was hard, and after dancing there for hours, your body really didn’t feel like your own.

He felt sorry for the members who didn’t know the future and were just saying the scenery was pretty. But for now, the schedule right in front of them was more important than the music video shoot.

“Good thing the venue is close.”

“We’ll be back at the dorm before midnight.”

The members’ continued chatter was swallowed by the radio playing in the car. The car sped across the highway, its destination a plaza in central Seoul.

Today’s first and last schedule was a big event that every idol who was doing well in Korea attended. Many foreigners came too, and every year the crowd was so huge it was hard to even see the screen properly. Today’s lineup was even more impressive than usual, so the crowd already gathering was likely enormous.

As soon as they arrived at the waiting room, the members prepared for the stage in their own ways. Jigu started warming up his throat while drinking water, and Hwiyoung closed his eyes quietly and took deep breaths to relax.

Yejun sat on the sofa and slowly let his gaze drift. Where his eyes landed, Jun was standing next to Hahyun, asking him something.

“Hyung. You know this part here.”

“Yeah. Why?”

“When I monitored it last time, going straight in didn’t feel right. Should we count one, two and go? Or count to three and go?”

“Wait a sec.”

Hahyun swallowed the rest of his water and began explaining the move in detail.

“Count one, two, then go. That way it matches your beat. If you count to three, you have to rush too much when you go in.”

“One, two?”

“Yeah.”

Jun had the least skill, so he was always asking questions and working hard. Yejun found that eagerness to learn endearing, so he always praised him a lot.

Watching Jun’s slightly awkward but busy movements, Yejun let out a short laugh and turned his eyes to his phone. ‘He was that young.’

On the waiting room monitor, a girl group was dancing brightly on stage. The event was already nearing its end. At an event like this, the order was a measure of popularity, and Reve’s turn was almost dead last.

They had two songs planned. Their debut song and the title track from their last comeback, which had been a huge hit.

“After the first song, walk to the very back of the stage, then walk back out to the front.”

“Okay.”

Five minutes until they went on stage. Everything was perfectly prepared, but Jun’s phone, left on the sofa, started ringing. The manager, who had been watching from behind as Jun brought the phone to his ear, snapped at him.

“Hey, Jun. Who’s calling you right now?”

Maybe because they were about to go on, his voice was sharp. Jun hurriedly caught the phone with both hands as if he might drop it and looked at the manager.

“Sorry, I’ll hang up quickly… Yes?”

Whatever he heard on the other end made his busy movements stop. Yejun, who had been quietly receiving a final makeup check, opened his closed eyes and glanced at Jun.

“Wait, wait a moment. Please don’t hang up.”

His voice was urgent. Jun approached the manager without ending the call.

“Hyung. I need to go to the hospital, the hospital…”

“What? Hey, you have to go on stage now.”

The manager said with a bewildered expression. It wasn’t a recorded broadcast; it was a live event, so of course he couldn’t easily accept someone suddenly saying they couldn’t go on.

Jun couldn’t keep his feet still, looking anxious. Yejun immediately caught how badly the hand clutching the hem of his clothes was trembling.

This had never happened before. Only then did Yejun become certain. This life was definitely flowing differently from the last one.

“Why. What’s going on?”

The members, who had been waiting quietly in their own spots, gathered around the manager at the commotion.

Hahyun was the first to speak and ask, and Jun didn’t answer. More precisely, it didn’t seem like a situation where he could answer. He looked so unstable, like someone who couldn’t hear anything.

“Is it really urgent? Just finish this first and go. You can come down in ten minutes.”

“Ah, ah. Yes. Yes.”

He looked like he was about to cry. Seeing Jun put down the phone without saying anything more at the manager’s firm response, Yejun raised his hand without thinking.

“I’ll cover his part too.”

“You haven’t even practiced it. Can you do it?”

“We can leave his spot empty, and I can go out twice during the individual parts in the middle. If he goes on stage in this state, he won’t be able to do anything.”

There was no way he could perform properly if he went up trembling like that. They’d be lucky if he didn’t drop the mic or cry while singing.

Yejun couldn’t know exactly what the situation was, but he had a vague idea. ‘It must be his mother.’ So Yejun made the best choice as the leader and as the older brother who had looked after him for ten years.

“I’ll take responsibility, so please let him go for now.”

Jun’s condition rarely fluctuated. When other members were sick, he worried beside them, but he himself was rarely ever sick, and he always ate and slept well.

Come to think of it, he had always been so bright it was almost inhuman. Why had he never thought that was strange? The reason was simple. Every day looked happy, so Yejun just thought that was the kind of kid he was.

After five years of living and working together, when he thought the members had completely opened their hearts to each other, they had all once sat in the dorm living room and talked honestly.

When Jigu talked about how hard his trainee days were, and when Hahyun talked about collapsing on the day of his college entrance exam. Jun only sympathized with his hyungs’ stories and felt sad with them. He had never once brought up his own story.

It wasn’t that he had nothing to say. Maybe he just didn’t want to. The thought suddenly occurred to him.

Yejun bent down slightly and grabbed Jun’s shoulder. Jun’s head, which had been hanging low, slowly rose.

“Hyung.”

“Hey, I’m going this far for you. Aren’t you going to run?”

Yejun deliberately raised his voice, grabbed Jun, and pushed him toward the manager.

“Hyung, please take him in the car first.”

In the sudden chaos, the manager pulled out the car keys with a dazed expression, and Yejun gathered the members and went up to the stage.

He had felt it during rehearsal that morning, but once he was up there, the stage was narrow. It was an outdoor stage set up in a plaza, so there were big spatial limits, and since it was live, mistakes couldn’t be undone.

Waiting for the music that would start in a moment, Yejun turned around. The music hadn’t even started, but the noise suggested people had noticed there were only four of them on stage.

The song began, and as soon as Hahyun, who had the first part, stepped forward, Yejun urgently ran through the simulation in his head.

He had done this for so long that he had most of the members’ parts memorized, but doing it suddenly made his head feel like it would burst. Only five minutes ago, he hadn’t known he would be covering Jun’s parts too. Anyone could see it was an absurd situation.

‘Ah, f*ck. This is why you shouldn’t shoot your mouth off first.’ Before the curse could escape, Jun’s part appeared, and Yejun hurried forward.

He had mostly done rap, but it wasn’t like he had never sung. He sang two lines smoothly and was about to lower the mic when his own rap part came right after, so he opened his mouth again.

Yejun barely held back a grimace and focused all his attention on the stage, while the other members also tried to fill the empty spaces as best they could.

Since they hadn’t even practiced once, mistakes big and small were inevitable. It was a relief they didn’t collide with each other. Yejun roughly followed Jun’s movements from memory and somehow finished the stage. He had only covered one person’s share, but the fatigue was ten times worse.

“Hey, hey, greetings.”

He wanted to lie down anywhere as soon as possible, but the voice telling him to greet pulled him back. To Reve, who had just reached their first year, everyone here was a senior. Even if he was annoyed, there was nothing he could do. He couldn’t ignore them and go in alone.

Holding onto his reason, he bowed his head toward the seniors passing through the waiting room hallway. Only after a long while was Yejun finally able to enter the waiting room.

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