The next morning, I read Hyemi’s text again. I haven’t responded, though it’s likely she’s seen that I’ve read it. I want to tell her the truth, about my own feelings for Nathaniel, but I want to share that with her in person, so I can explain everything in full. I feel awful knowing she’ll be devastated when I tell her.
Below Hyemi’s text is one from Nathaniel. I can’t wait to see you tonight.
It’s Saturday, which means Ajumma won’t be at the house until tomorrow morning, a day earlier than usual, as her daughter is hosting her in-laws.
Nathaniel and I will be alone tonight. My heart thrums at the thought.
On my phone, I bring up my mother’s number, skipping Secretary Park altogether. My thumbs hover over the keyboard before I quickly type a message. Are you busy today? Can I come by your office? I click Send before I can second-guess myself.
A stuffed whale slips from my bed as I push back the blankets. My phone chirps and I reach for it eagerly. But the message isn’t from my mother.
Kim Sun Ye: Come to Joah immediately. There’s an emergency.
Twenty minutes later, I burst into the practice room. Hyemi’s hunched in the middle of the floor. Sun Ye sits beside her, rubbing her back in a circular motion.
I crouch on Hyemi’s other side. “What’s going on?” The other members aren’t present, only Sun Ye. Secretary Park stands with her back against the mirror, furiously typing on her phone.
“I’m going to quit the group,” Hyemi bawls. “It’s not fair to the other girls.”
My eyes widen. I look to Sun Ye to elaborate.
Sun Ye hands me her phone. “Someone left an anonymous post on a popular forum,” she says, “about the agreement Hyemi’s father had with Joah.”
Dread curls in my stomach as I read the article.
A Joah insider confirmed yesterday evening that ASAP member Woo Hyemi’s last-minute addition to the girl group was contingent upon a sizable investment by her father, shipping magnate Woo Gongchul.
I wince. This is bad. The article goes on to slam the company’s business ethics, throwing around words like nepotism and bribery, and ends with a call to boycott ASAP.
“Th-they said,” Hyemi begins in a choked voice, barely able to speak through her tears, “I’m o-only in the group because of my f-father’s money.”
“That’s not true,” I say. Or at least, maybe that was the case in the beginning, but she’s proven herself time and again; she belongs in ASAP. Anyone who watched the showcase would think this without a doubt.
“Once they see how hardworking and talented you are, none of this will matter,” I say.
Hyemi starts to sob even louder.
I look to Sun Ye once more.
“The first episode of the debut documentary went up,” she explains. “Hyemi’s receiving a lot of negativity in the comments.”
“I’m calling my father,” Hyemi says. “I’ll tell him I want to quit.”
“You can’t do that,” I say sharply. Her father has yet to sign the contract.
My tone of voice startles her, and she looks up. The hurt and confusion in her eyes is like a dagger through the chest. For a brief moment, I sounded just like my father—coldhearted, manipulative.
I take a deep breath. “Was it such a quick decision to join the group?”
“Of course not. I’ve wanted this for as long as I can remember.”
“Then give as much consideration to your decision to leave as you did to join. There’s no need to rush. You’ve already debuted. Get some rest, and we’ll talk tomorrow.”
As I stand, I notice Sun Ye watching me. There’s a question in the slight frown on her face. Did you know about this? I avoid her gaze.
On the way out of the room, I pass Secretary Park. She’s moved on from aggressively texting to whispering loudly over the phone. “I don’t care what you have to do, just get them to take the post down.”
Without really thinking about where I’m going, I ride the elevator up to my mother’s office.
It’s empty, as is the attached bedroom, though there’s evidence of my mother’s return, her suitcase half unpacked on a luggage rack by her closet.
Collapsing on the high-backed chair behind her desk, I close my eyes. This situation must be salvageable. It has to be. Though I can’t see a way forward. Joah can deny the claims made in the post, but since so much of the article is true, it’ll be difficult to refute it if more evidence arises.
And I feel uneasy about the thought of outwardly lying. I don’t think anything is owed to tabloids and gossip magazines, but a company and a group should be honest with their fans. Otherwise, how can they build trust with one another? I also don’t know what a lie like that would do to Hyemi’s mental health. I remember Director Ryu’s emphasis on the group’s emotional health, along with their physical health. The company needs to protect Hyemi and ASAP as a group. I feel another rush of shame that it wasn’t my first thought when Hyemi said she wanted to quit the group. I’d thought of her father’s money. Would quitting be better for her?
My gaze catches on my mother’s topmost drawer, pulled slightly open. When I move to shut it, the drawer catches on something crammed inside. Shimmying it open, I pull out a photograph.
I stare down at it, uncomprehending.
It’s a photograph of me from my middle school graduation. I’m wearing my uniform, looking directly at the camera with a slight frown on my face.
The edges of the photograph are worn, an indication that my mother has picked it up quite a few times over the years. I feel an ache in my chest, as if I’ve caught my mother with a secret.
I gently place the photograph in the drawer. As I’m putting it back, I notice an envelope inside. I pick it up, slipping the documents onto the desk.
It takes me a few pages to understand what it is. A contract, outlining the acquisition of Joah by KS Entertainment. It’s unsigned but dated for next week. This is my mother’s solution if Hyemi’s father doesn’t invest. She’s going to sell Joah.
The elevator pings. I quickly shove the contract back into the desk and close it just as my mother walks out of the elevator.
“Sori?” She steps from the foyer, stopping in the middle of the room. “What are you doing here?”
“Sun Ye told me to come. Because of Hyemi.”
She rubs her eyes tiredly. “Where is Hyemi now?”
“She’s with Sun Ye. They’re going back to the dorm.”
My mother collapses onto the couch, leaning back with a heavy sigh.
Moving from behind the desk, I grab a bottle of cold water from a small refrigerator filled with them and walk over to her. Uncapping it, I hand it to her. She takes the bottle, drinking half of it before placing it on the table. “How is it you always know what I need most?” she says softly.
I want to ask her about the contract in the desk, but instead I say, “You should come home. You’ll rest better in your own bed, and Ajumma can cook for you.”
“Soon, Sori-yah. I will, soon.” I don’t believe her, but I want to.
“How are you feeling?” she says.
I blink at her, confused.
“You collapsed on the set of that drama. I was so worried. I should have been there with you. Instead, I was in Japan, trying to secure more investors, except that wound up fruitless in the end. I’m terrible at everything, aren’t I? A terrible businesswoman, a terrible mother.”
“You’re not!” I say vehemently. “You’re trying so hard. There’s no one I look up to more than you. No one I believe in more.”
Her life has been filled with challenges, from losing her parents at a young age—her wealthy, distant aunt had hired Ajumma to raise her—to becoming an idol, only to have that dream cut short when she became pregnant with me. To think she at least would have a loving family, only for her in-laws to reject her and her husband to abandon her, maybe not legally but in all the ways that matter. She then changed course and put all her time and energy into making this company what it is today, employing so many people, fulfilling the dreams of its artists. I’ve felt frustrated with her, resentful, even, but I’ve never stopped believing in her.
“My sweet girl.” She brings her hand to my face, pressing her fingers to my cheek for a brief, halting moment. “You give me strength. You always have.”
She drops her hand and closes her eyes. “As long as there’s not another fire, I think I can handle this week.”
Another fire. Another scandal.
“Can you turn the lights off when you leave? I think I’ll just rest right here for a little bit.”
She’s asleep within minutes. I grab a blanket and pillow from the spare room. I lift her head gently and place the pillow beneath, then cover her with the blanket.
I don’t go directly home but take the bus around the city. To me, Seoul is always beautiful, but there’s something about the capital at dusk, with the sun banked on the horizon, turning the sky a hazy pinkish-purple, the bright lights of the signboards blurring like watercolors, that makes me think it might be the most beautiful city in the world.
Two years ago, I’d done this very thing, after I had the conversation with my mother that led to my breakup with Nathaniel. As I stare out the window toward the city, I think back to that conversation.
We were in my mother’s office, just the two of us, the XOXO members having gone back to their dorm.
“I contacted the news outlet. They’ve agreed to blur out your photo. You’ll be an ‘unnamed trainee,’” my mother announced.
I’d frowned. “But then Nathaniel will take the brunt of the criticism.”
“Sori, that’s a good thing. A dating scandal with an unnamed trainee is better than a dating scandal with the CEO’s daughter. All the hate would be piled onto you, the more vulnerable target, and I wouldn’t even be able to protect Nathaniel because my name would be tarnished as well, as I allowed this to happen. It should have never happened. I wasn’t careful. This is my fault.”
BULLETIN, the infamous tabloid newspaper, had hinted that they were going to post a dating scandal involving “the lead singer of a popular boyband.” Already, online speculation had concluded that the singer was Nathaniel, and XOXO’s videos were being flooded with comments asking for Joah to expel Nathaniel from the group.
“You two will have to break up.”
I shook my head, unwilling to accept what she was telling me. “But what if Nathaniel and I were to face this together?” Nathaniel had said as much when I’d come to him in tears. That we’d weather the storm, together.
My mother’s eyes turned pitying. “You’re young and in love, so you’re not thinking clearly. I was the same, when . . .” She didn’t have to finish that sentence, when I married your father. “Don’t you remember what happened when you were in middle school?”
A shiver of fear swept through me, remembering the bullying at school, the comments shouted at my mother, for driving my father into having an affair—for being cold, for being unlovable.
“It would be the same, but ten times worse. People like Nathaniel can throw caution to the wind in grand, romantic gestures, but that’s because they’ve never known what it’s like to be alone. They can bear criticism and censure from the public because they have their families who will support them. You and I don’t have that luxury. We’ve always had to stand on our own.”
She’d been right. Nathaniel only knew a small part of the bullying I endured in middle school, the name-calling and isolation. Because I kept it from him. I wanted to protect him from the awfulness of my life—that shining boy, who always had a smile on his face, who always had a smile for me.
I thought of that time in New York with his family, how different our lives were. He would have them to go back to, without fail, that warm home filled with laughter.
“All we have is each other,” my mother said. “It’s always been just the two of us. I can’t bear to see you hurt. I will protect you as best I can, but . . .”
She’s my mother, but she’s also the CEO of Joah. She has the company to think about, the hundreds of employees whose livelihoods depend upon her. I was racked with guilt. By causing a scandal, I’d jeopardized not only Nathaniel’s career, but her company, everything she’d worked so hard for.
“I know you care for Nathaniel, but sometimes life is about making painful decisions in the present to avoid greater pain later. It’s better to cut things off before your feelings grow any stronger.”
I nodded. Her words sunk into my skin, wrapping around my heart.
“I’m sorry I’m asking this of you. Promise me you’ll break it off?”
Nathaniel wanted to risk everything for love, but that wasn’t reasonable for someone like me, with so much to lose. What if the worst happened and we broke up? He’d have his family, his burgeoning career. XOXO was already so popular. While I’d have hurt my mother’s company, my own chances at a career, and in the end, I’d have been as I was before he came hurtling into my life—bringing with him laughter, friendship, and love—completely and devastatingly alone.
“I promise.”