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doiefy · 5 months ago

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dive // kim doyoung // preview

In the six or seven years that you’d considered Doyoung as more than just a friend, definitively describing your relationship with him had always been difficult. You were ‘lovers,’ essentially, but that sounded much too dreamy for either of your tastes; ‘significant others,’ perhaps, an all-encompassing and rather conservative term, but too harsh on the ears. ‘Girlfriend and boyfriend’ didn’t seem quite right to you, considering how private you’d kept it since the very beginning.

An entertainment agency with no fear of bankruptcy, scraping together a co-ed act despite its inherent unpopularity—the both of you involved—had made things awfully complicated.

pairing: kim doyoung x f. reader (she/her pronouns) tags: non-canon idolverse (NCT and other groups don’t necessarily exist in this, I just took a lot of inspiration from the Korean pop industry. it feels like realistic fiction but also not really), somewhat slow burn, slice of life at times, friends to lovers, angst, fluff, it’s also at least 10% crack word count: 6.8k preview, 40k+ full fic (fuck off, I’m not sorry) cw: preview includes mild language, alcohol. full fic includes smoking/vaping and drugs as poor coping mechanisms, anxiety and one instance of a panic attack, suggestive content

taglist available; reply or message me! I anticipate this will be out by end of August, I only have three more chapters to write!

additional notes: - kard is the blueprint!!! they induce so much bisexual panic in me and I love them so much, it’s probably pretty clear that I took inspiration from them and their artistry for this fic hehe. - I have a lot of thoughts on this realistic fiction genre I’m dabbling in but will hold off on sharing them here… just know that it’s written to feel realistic but god knows what actually happens behind the scenes in K-pop; none of this is meant to be speculative or mean, I’m just having a bit of fun. if you’re someone who actually gets deep into the industry drama and how the industry works, don’t get hung up on the details. please.

prologue: in the blur of the rain

For once, you were thankful for the rain.

It was a momentary relief from the heat of Seoul summers: a gust of coldness to push aside the heavy haze of pollution, and a steady stream of water to wash away the smell of cigarette smoke always lingering around your building. Sprawled out on a lawn chair with your legs stretched out, you watched mindlessly as the rainwater spilled into and accumulated in the balcony above yours. The rhythm of the water hitting the concrete was mesmerizing. Woosh, splat. Like glass, the drops shattered into a fine mist that sprayed your bare feet. Woosh, splat. Next to you, Doyoung mumbled something about the weather. Splat, splat.

“Aren’t you cold?” he asked. He’d joined you shortly after you stepped outside, disappointed by the gloominess of the low-hanging clouds, but content to sit with you nonetheless. Pleasantries, a couple of laughs over the beers he’d brought over from your fridge, then you’d sat in silence. Until the wind picked up a great deal and begged the inevitable question.

You glanced over at him, quickly understanding what he really meant. Huddled in a hoodie with his hair damp from the shower and the circular lenses of his glasses starting to fog up, he was cold. A man of surprising patience and sympathy who was always willing to stay as long as you did, but you supposed his will was wearing thin in the rain.

“Not really,” you shrugged. “You?”

“A little,” came a rather impassive response through a stifled yawn. He stretched his arms above his head lazily, then curled back into himself. “Mostly just tired. The alcohol’s making me sleepy.”

You snorted, unimpressed. “Mina’s gonna be real unhappy when she finds her stuff missing from the fridge.”

Doyoung grunted. “She owes me money.”

“For what, drinks from McDonald’s? Don’t we all?” you joked, patting his arm in mock reassurance. “You can go inside if you want. I’ll probably stay awhile.”

“Mm, I’ll manage.”

It fell silent again. There was some hidden reminder in both his words and the rain: a constant backdrop, constant background noise that was bound to be brought up explicitly soon, as much as you wanted it to stay buried. It had been like this for a couple weeks, ever since Doyoung sat down with management and made the decision. You were all aware of his choice, certainly not thrilled by it in the slightest, but dutifully observing a countdown—only five days, presently. There would be another, after the first hit zero, but you’d already decided that you wouldn’t count the days until his return.

There were plenty of crying, heartbroken fans of his who would gladly do it for you, anyway.

As you reached into the pocket of your jacket for something, you suddenly felt a judgemental gaze following you. Doyoung watched with incredulous amusement as you pulled the vape pen from its hiding spot to take a long drag. It was a bad habit that your manager hated and Doyoung liked to make fun of, but neither of them made efforts to stop you. There were worse things you could’ve been doing.

“Oh, I see,” Doyoung laughed, reaching over to absentmindedly massage your shoulder, where he knew you always tensed up. Had the two of you been in public, that was one of the worse things you could’ve been doing: giving the people any reason to doubt the nature of your relationship. “Should’ve guessed this was why you came out here.”

“Yeah,” you admitted, then showed him the pen: newly-ordered with your last pay cheque, pale pink and sparkly. “Wanted to take the new girlie for a spin.”

Ever curious, or maybe just looking for another excuse to ridicule you, Doyoung plucked it from your hand and took a hit. “Gross,” was the final verdict along with an exaggerated face of disgust, as he handed it back to you. “I don’t know why you and Johnny do this shit willingly.”

You shrugged. “Stress.”

“You wanna talk about it?”

“About what?”

Doyoung stared at you like it was obvious, yet not impatiently—one of the many things you liked about him, especially when the industry had a mean little habit of making you feel dumb and oblivious. “What’s stressing you out?”

There it was, the onset of the conversation you’d been waiting to have. “You. What else?”

He raised a brow, grinning sarcastically. “You don’t think I can survive two years in the military and fulfill a responsibility that’s to be fulfilled by every good and able-bodied Korean son in the country?”

“Please. You can barely learn an entire choreography without bitching about back pain at least once.” You rolled your eyes and brought the vape back up to your lips.

“What about the good son part?”

You’d met his parents before: hard-working, upper-middle class folks from the suburbs who had undoubtedly wanted their kids to pursue law or medicine for sake of job security, only to get an actor and singer instead. Cackling at the promise of getting a rise out of him, you met his gaze with glee. “I think it’s really sweet that you buy your mama designer stuff all the time. But she probably wanted that money from a well-respected lawyer, not a K-pop idol who clowns around on national television for a living.”

Doyoung glared and flipped you off, but it was all in good fun. “Right back at you.” Then in a disbelieving murmur from behind his drink, “I’d be a pretty fucking hot lawyer though.”

You sighed in agreement, the notion making you feel more dreamy than you would care to admit—but for good reason other than the fact that he would make a very hot lawyer. “Oh, how life would be so much easier.”

“We probably think that because this is the only life we’ve ever known,” Doyoung smiled softly as a certain sense of contemplation settled over the balcony. You both knew it was true, and would eventually settle for some semblance of normalcy when given the opportunity. You could hardly despise your jobs, nor could you fully embrace it. Like any other employment, it was just that. Only yours seemed to define you as a person much more than any other 9 to 6 in the city would a typical person.

“Will you be okay?” he asked a little later, watching you blow lazy smoke rings. The concern was more genuine than usual, prodding at emotions you’d kept bottled up for the better half of the week. “It’s… Sunday.” You knew he was counting down the days too. “I’m going on Friday.”

“I don’t know if it’s quite registered yet. It’ll probably hit harder once you’re gone,” you said. “But I mean, two years isn’t the worst. We’re used to it.”

“We’re used to not being with each other. We’re not used to being without each other completely.”

Ah. Another conversation to be had, when he came back. Now just a bit more dejected by the mere mention, you joked, “There’s a difference?”

“There’s a difference.”

You knew the difference, of course. You could explain it in great detail if you wanted to, covering the years of history behind it and the gruelling effort you’d put into keeping a story alive. But it was a story that never made it further than Doyoung and yourself, echoing just slightly to reach Mina and Johnny in muted detail as well.

In the six or seven years that you’d considered yourselves as more than just friends, definitively describing your relationship had always been difficult. You were ‘lovers,’ essentially, but that sounded much too dreamy for either of your tastes; ‘significant other,’ perhaps, an all-encompassing and rather conservative term, but too harsh on the ears. ‘Girlfriend and boyfriend’ didn’t seem quite right to you, considering how private you’d kept it since the very beginning.

An entertainment agency with no fear of bankruptcy, scraping together a co-ed act despite its inherent unpopularity—the both of you involved—had made things awfully complicated.

But in all the ten or eleven years that you’d known each other just as people, you’d never been apart for so long. You’d never been without him as just a friend. Even the occasional modelling or acting gig on his end took no more than a few months, while your solo work only peppered your usual schedules with overnights at the studio. The fact that he was enlisting alone was possibly the saddest part, with you and Mina obviously exempted, and Johnny too by his American citizenship. From seeing him almost every day to only once or twice a year… it would be hard on you all, but on you in particular.

Sensing your low spirits, Doyoung still found it in himself to joke, “You’re gonna hate my hair.”

You groaned, refusing to imagine him with the dreaded buzz cut and green beret. “Fuck, don’t remind me. I’m not searching you up on Naver for the next two years.”

“You search me up on Naver?”

“Shut up.”

But he was unwilling to let it go that easily. “Aww, that’s cute. You know what? Between me and you…” Scooting closer with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes but hardly a waver in his voice, he whispered, “I search myself up too.”

“You’re so annoying,” you scoffed, blowing smoke in his face.

“You love that about me,” he grinned, then leaned in to kiss you.

For years, you’d always jolted away when he did it—purely out of paranoia, always worried that someone was watching. But Doyoung was unbelievably meticulous: restricting himself to the dorms, his car, and occasionally his family’s empty vacation home. Never in the company building. Never anywhere else. It wasn’t often either; for the most part, you abstained from any romantic gestures, lest you got used to it and went too far in public without even knowing it.

It became muscle memory after that, for you to startle away and for him to coax you back to him, for you to trust his judgement of your surroundings and safety. In the spur of the moment this time, he wrapped his arms around your waist and pulled you gently into his lap. You knew he already missed you from the abruptness of his affection to the way he kissed you breathless. And while you thought about how he would be stolen away from you for the second time and reminisced all the times you had to hold back from going all the way, you were infinitely grateful for the stormy skies.

Because in the blur of the rain, the world was none the wiser to who you were, or who you were to each other.

i. never grow up

You met Kim Doyoung on your first day at the company, in a dingy storage closet.

You were eighteen at the time—fresh out of high school and your old entertainment company, where you had few prospects apart from amassing crippling debt and cameos on rigged survival shows. You couldn’t quite despise the shitty management though, or the hellish programs they offered. Because at the very least, they’d help you stick your foot in the door. Finding your next destination was hardly difficult, especially when a family friend of yours distributed the company’s business cards as a side hustle.

Taeyong responded almost instantly when you asked him for help, then sent you a blurry picture of a pink card drenched in someone’s beer. Vitamin Entertainment. A quick Naver search brought up a number of decently-successful acts, mostly soloists and actors. And a recently-disbanded idol group, which was most reassuring.

“Don’t I need to audition?” you asked meekly when he called to make sure you’d gotten his message.

He was tipsy at a party, slurring and tripping over his words. “Nooooo, sweetheart. You’re hot and experienced, don’t waste your time. Either email them a link to your old YouTube channel, or I’ll do it for you.”

“I’ll do it,” you grumbled. “Speak nothing of the YouTube channel or I’ll kidnap your dog.”

“Okay, whatever you say,” Taeyong chirped, obnoxiously sing-song as always. “Well then, my dear, the bubbles are bubbling and the wine is flowing! Love ya, see you later, make sure to send that email, okay byeeeeeeee—”

The line went dead, and you reluctantly powered on your laptop to do as he’d told you.

Imagine your surprise when someone got back to you two weeks later and asked you to come in. Either Taeyong had put in a word for you and your tape was impeccable (you knew it wasn’t, you’d filmed it at 2 AM), or they were desperate.

Your expectations plummeted when Google Maps took you to a rose-tinted glass building in the scrappiest part of the neighbourhood. And they hit rock bottom when you found yourself in a lobby modelled tactlessly after a container of children’s gummy vitamins.

The floors were a checkerboard pattern of blue and aquamarine tiles, while the uneven plaster walls were painted salmon pink. The furniture strewn about the foyer were made from cheap, hard plastic, resembling sheets of gelatin and brightly-coloured candy. Caricature drawings of Vitamin artists and CEOs stared at you from their glass frames while a manager took you on a tour. Your first response within twenty minutes of arrival was to check that your contact lenses hadn’t fallen out of your eyes; there was something very vague and blurry about the place, which seemed to bleed into the atmosphere and all the people you passed by.

“New here?” a few of them would ask you in passing, be it other trainees or instructors, and you always responded with a polite nod. They’d shrug nonchalantly and welcome you with a simple, “Cool,” before moving on. You didn’t doubt that they were busy, yet they seemed to float around aimlessly, like idle characters in a video game.

It didn’t help that the trainee floor felt like a game too: a game of interpreting awkwardly-placed signs and room numbers that more often than not took you to all the wrong places. The fated storage closet was just one of them, hidden behind a mirrored door you thought would lead to an empty practice room.

“What the hell?”

Upon entering, you were met with lopsided IKEA shelves filled to their maximum capacities with cleaning supplies and cardboard boxes. It was a back room not meant to be associated with the company’s poppy, pretty exterior: drab but organic, clearly deviating from the standard blue-pink candy colour scheme. Amidst the mess sat a boy around your age, pale faced, black haired, wearing round glasses. He was perched atop an old washing machine, his focus glued insistently to a mobile game, until you unceremoniously barged in. Then he looked up like a deer caught in headlights, instinctively shoving the phone into the front pocket of his hoodie.

“Hi.”

You stared at him, confused. “Sorry, uh… this isn’t practice room B, is it?”

“This is practice room D,” he said.

You stared at him. He stared back—completely deadpan for several seconds before breaking into a toothy smile. “I’m just messing with you. B’s around the corner, on your right.”

“Thanks.”

“New here?”

Like you already had several times that day, you nodded. But unlike previous occurrences, he didn’t welcome you halfheartedly and then float away—or rightfully kick you out of his hiding spot. Instead, he noted your attire and demeanour, both of which lacked the usual jitters and nervousness of a new recruit. “But not new to the scene, are we?”

“No, not really,” you said.

“How long?” It was a touchy question amongst trainees, strangers especially. Yet from him, it hardly seemed invasive, only curious.

“Two years now.”

Intrigued, he hopped down from the washing machine. Even back then, he hovered a few inches above you, just a little lanky, still in the process of growing into himself. “Me too. Debut is a scam.”

“A scam you and I keep falling for,” you reminded him with a chuckle.

To your relief, he cracked another smile. “You’re so right,” he laughed, sticking his hand out to shake. “Kim Doyoung. Welcome to Vitamin.”

You would soon learn that Doyoung took everything with good humour. And from that alone, you knew you would become good friends.

You saw each other quite frequently after that. For the sake of their finances, the companies had lumped all their trainees together regardless of gender and experience. You tripped over yourselves in cramped dance studios and listened to strained voices together in vocal rooms. On weekends, you slept for eighteen hours at a time and debated dropping out to pursue proper higher education, only answering calls from your fellow trainees if it involved free food. And on Monday mornings, you got right back to work.

It was less busy in the wintertime, thankfully. When the foreign trainees were granted long breaks to see their families and the high schoolers took time off to study for their finals, you and Doyoung had to keep each other company. Little got done those days, as you opted to play variations of “Fuck Marry Kill” or “Never Have I Ever” over soju from a plastic soda bottle.

“Johnny, Yuta and Airi,” Doyoung prompted with a snicker and took a lazy swig, as if it were anything but an easy decision.

“Oh, c’mon,” you retorted, stealing the bottle back from him. “Kill John, obviously.”

“Good choice.”

“I’d pay money to marry Airi. And then fuck Yuta.”

“Way to immediately ruin your marriage.”

It was pure reflex to hit him hard on the head, with the closest thing you could find. “Not in that order, smartass!”

Unfazed, Doyoung only glared at you. “Just for that attitude, we’re skipping your turn.”

“What type of fucking rules— Wait—”

“Airi, the nail tech who ruined your set last month, and…” He trailed off playfully, purposely making you wait in irritation—but your impatience quickly turned into shock. “Me.”

You damn well choked on your own spit.

You’d never seen Doyoung that way, much less had any time to entertain those kinds of thoughts. Maybe some quiet recognition and acknowledgement when you first met him, which was about a year ago now: just a respectful and very private nod to how well he would do as a celebrity. He was polite when he talked, pretty when he sang, confident when he danced… but were you appreciating those qualities because you needed them yourself? Or did they really make you see him in a different light?

“I’m still marrying Airi,” you started defensively. “Killing the nail tech. She literally scammed me. And did you see that neon pink she used? Absolutely foul.”

Doyoung raised a brow. “And…?”

“If you ask me nicely, you might just get what you want.”

Silence. You stared at each other for a long moment, but ultimately both decided you’d had enough fun.

“Meh, I wouldn’t fuck you.”

“Yeah, me neither.”

It had always been easy to be so brutally honest with each other.

The incident went completely forgotten until a year later—one evening when you found yourselves in a tight circle with the other trainees, drinking beer and spinning Doyoung’s empty soju/soda bottle for shits and giggles. It was cliche, certainly. But you were all missing out on drunken college parties in the real world, and this was as good as entertainment would get.

The bottle spun and spun, making rounds but always narrowly avoiding you, picking and choosing duos to go into the notorious storage closet for the allotted seven minutes. Within half an hour, Yuta and Airi had come back disheveled, while Ten had returned with pink marks on his neck—the latter of which lost you five thousand won to Doyoung in a stupid bet. Not all pairings were so frivolous, however, with Johnny and Mark deciding to awkwardly play tic tac toe seven times on the same crumpled napkin.

By your impeccable luck and the good graces of the saints, the last spin of the bottle matched you with Doyoung.

“He’s probably just gonna fall asleep,” you grunted, then dragged him out of the room.

“You know, all of these losers have been faking it,” Doyoung said once you’d shut the door and set a timer on your phone. He sent you a knowing look. “I mean, if you’re hung up over Airi and Yuta, they probably just jogged on the spot for seven minutes. They respect each other way too much.”

“In that case, give me my money back,” you said, already making a grab for the five thousand won.

“What?” His hand immediately flew up to guard the pocket of his track pants, where he was keeping your money. “Oh no, Ten’s was probably real. You think he just punched himself in the throat for seven minutes while Kun watched?”

“Damn, okay, I didn’t know I was friends with fucking Sherlock Holmes himself.”

Doyoung cackled, slapping your shoulder hard enough to send you into the wall. “C’mon, they’ve liked each other—well, pretended to hate each other—for years now.”

Then for whatever reason, your last game of ‘Fuck Marry Kill’ suddenly crossed your mind.

“Should we do them all one better?”

He was skeptical, but perhaps more so by the logistics than the notion of actually doing it. He checked the timer. “How, by actually making out? We’ve got, like, five minutes.”

“That seems like a good amount of time.”

He paused and looked down at the timer again. You were left anticipating his reply for just a few seconds, but there was little anxiety attached to it.

“Fuck it, why not.”

He set your phone down on the nearest shelf, turned you around to face him, and suddenly his lips were on yours.

That was the very first time you flinched away. It wasn’t bad, or even that weird considering your being friends, but there was a sudden confidence behind it that made you realize two things. One: there were multiple sides to this guy, as there were with all people, and one you had never taken seriously. Two: the side of him you were missing was his attractiveness.

You parted from him to catch your breath, completely caught off guard by the way he’d tucked a finger under your chin and lifted your head up to meet him halfway (where the hell did he learn that from, K-dramas?). His hands quickly found your shoulders instead, comforting despite the way his eyes widened and he rushed to apologize. “Too much?”

“No, I just—” You laughed. “Surprised, that’s all.”

He caught onto your train of thought quickly enough, and when you didn’t protest, gently crowded you against the wall. “Didn’t think I’d have some experience after twenty years of life? I’m not a stick in the mud.”

“Straight A’s in high school, perfect attendance, vice president of the student council, after school volunteering, part-time tutoring—”

“A surprising number of girls were into that,” Doyoung retorted, then grinned proudly. “Boys too.”

“Ugh, so you peaked in high school, we get it,” you grumbled.

“Ugh, so you’re jealous, we get it.”

“Shut up.”

“Got it.”

With that said, he pressed his lips back to yours and snaked an arm around your waist—with a surprising amount of care given the spontaneity of this entire ploy in the first place. Not one to be outdone, you wrapped your arms around his neck and pulled him closer. It didn’t take long for him to grab both your wrists after that, pinning them above you and fully caging you in. It was undoubtedly rushed and messy as you raced against time, the alcohol from earlier obviously playing some part too.

When the timer went off, Doyoung gently pushed off from the wall and reached for your phone. But his gaze never left yours—his eyes staying insistently dark and full of mischief even as he silenced the offensive ringtone. But eventually, he broke into laughter, at which point you realized he was messing with you again.

“That was fun,” he chirped as he fixed his hair in the reflection of a broken TV. Then jokingly, “I’d give it a 4 out of 5.”

You rolled your eyes. “Thanks Doyoung, your review helps small businesses like ours improve and get those five stars. Would you do it again?”

He swung around to look at you, surprised.

“Maybe.”

Funnily enough, “maybe” became something entirely different, as you began sneaking off with each other at every possible moment. Rarely to do something as scandalous as making out in a storage closet (although sometimes), but spending more time together nonetheless. You often forwent sleep entirely and wasted away the early hours with him, eating at random diners and burger joints, or watching the stars from an empty parking lot.

It became apparent pretty quickly: you’d been a little too studious in high school, and still tightly-wound two years after graduation. But now at twenty years of age, you felt some strange urge to develop a rebellious streak. Doyoung was no different despite always denying it, frequently taking his brother’s car out for joy rides and continuing to sneak alcohol into the practice rooms. Admittedly, he sometimes fell back into the old habitual role of goody-two-shoes, entertaining what-if scenarios and cover stories for use if the two of you ever got caught.

But you weren’t doing anything illegal, much less even wrong. Plenty of trainees spent their evenings doing much more questionable things. And no one at the company had formally banned you from dating as predebut, wannabe stars, although it was obviously frowned upon. And most importantly, neither you nor Doyoung had said anything about dating.

Surely it had crossed both your minds. On occasion, once he’d kissed you breathless and stared you down with some unfathomable emotion, you had to resist the urge to blurt out, “What are we, exactly?” It wasn’t just the present state of your relationship that mattered. It was all else that might follow.

If it was all for shits and giggles now, would it develop? With debut being the obvious goal after four years of gruelling work, what would you do if you both reached the goal and something had developed by then? Break up? Stay together secretly despite the obvious backlash that would ensue if people found out? After every sleepless night, every car ride, every midnight dinner, you caught yourself thinking about it.

Eight months later, things took an abrupt turn.

“Please tell me you’re joking.”

The bathroom door slammed shut behind you as you stormed into the common area of your dorm—now empty, with Mina out shopping and the two younger trainees you lived with having gone home for the weekend. Something about their absence and the lack of activity sharpened the rest of your senses, perpetuating the sharp sound of static that filled your phone call. The place had felt incredibly deserted for weeks, growing gloomier and quieter with every departure of an ex-trainee.

The company was down in numbers again.

“They can’t just—” you let out a muffled noise of frustration, putting Doyoung on speaker so you could continue stomping around. “I mean, why?!”

“Yuta leaving was the last straw,” Doyoung replied, just as agitated by the news. His voice cut in and out of white noise. “If he hadn’t, they could make do with debuting us as a trio and delaying you and the girls by a year or two. Or if Airi and Jiwoo were still here, the other way around—”

“But why are they in such a rush?” you spat. “What’s five years without putting out a new group? Bankruptcy?”

Doyoung didn’t respond. But you could tell it was because he was preoccupied. The sounds of city traffic and wind were prevalent on his end, as he presumably made haste toward some place. Suddenly, it went silent. A door swung open, then clanged shut. “C’mon,” he said breathlessly. “I’m downstairs.”

You grabbed only your phone and keys before stumbling out to find him. Not knowing how he’d arrived so quickly, you could only be grateful that you weren’t all alone.

Upon seeing him, you practically launched yourself from the stairs and crashed into his arms. The anger and frustration hit all at once, as you buried your head into his chest—burning hot and relentless against all reason, far too overwhelming as it pushed down on you. Then came embarrassment and overwhelming discomfort for even feeling angry in the first place. Was it selfish to be this angry? Was it selfish to feel so much hatred?

They’d served you a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity on a silver platter, yet you could only think of yourself. You could only blurt out one scathing hot truth that would have sent your younger trainee self into hysterics:

“I don’t want this.”

Doyoung was calm as ever, but you could hear the strain in his voice. “I know.”

“I— It’s stupid! No one asked for this. I didn’t sacrifice four years of my life to put up with this!”

There was no reply this time. Not for a long time. When you finally resurfaced from the warm fleece of his scarf for air, he was wiping the tears from your cheeks. A physical outburst from the overload of conflicting emotions, one you had hardly noticed.

At the core of the situation was just that: conflict. You were torn between relief and apprehension, joy and anger, so incredibly relieved that your efforts hadn’t gone to waste, but so disgusted by the company’s blatant reach for attention. So eager to take the offer, but terrified that it would prove to be the wrong decision.

You, Doyoung, Mina and Johnny. It was a lineup unlike anything anyone had seen in years, unconventional in the Korean pop scene for obvious reasons. All you had to do was sign the documents. Then debut was all yours—likely alongside criticism and skepticism from everyone watching.

“I know I’m being ungrateful,” you said, barely louder than a whisper. “But I didn’t sign up to deal with ridicule and rumours the moment we’re announced. Why do we have to deal with that bullshit when the consequences are their fault?”

When it came to consolation, people failed to acknowledge the necessity of a listening ear over advice. And in that moment, you were grateful that Doyoung listened. No unsolicited comments pointing out your tendency to blow things out of proportion, no attempt to calm you with reason. It was in Doyoung’s nature to analyze, to stay logical, to stay grounded in reality at every sharp turn of the road. But he did nothing of the sort, knowing it wasn’t in yours. There was only a warm embrace to cling onto—then a simple reassurance that would’ve broken you, had it not come from someone who really meant it.

“We’ll be okay.”

He let you settle back against him. For several minutes after that, you rocked back and forth in his arms, thinking to yourself, Will we though? It had finally dawned on you, what awaited you in the coming days, months, years, even.

“What about us?” What… are we?”

He mustered a wry grimace at the question, slowly pulling apart to hold you at arm’s length. The weariness of his expression didn’t look right on the face of a 22-year-old. You wondered if you looked the same: tired and worn out years before the average person begins to wear. “Regardless of what we are now, regardless of what we become if we sign contracts, we were friends first. Right?”

You nodded, but suddenly found it difficult to look him in the eye.

“And at the end of the day—of any day, good or bad—we’ll always be friends, yeah?”

You’d seen him at his ugliest, and he’d seen you at yours: from his episodes of black-out drunkenness, to the insults you used to hurl at your parents over the phone. You’d fought on occasion too, exchanging backhanded comments and getting into full-blown arguments before reconciling later. There was nothing to hide from each other, and no one you trusted more with your secrets. No one knew both you and the industry you worked in quite like him. It went both ways.

So you nodded again.

He gave you a wry smile. “Then let’s be friends while we deal with all the other shit. If we want to be something else some other time, we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.” There was a long, nervous breath, as his hands found yours to steady himself. “Is that okay with you?”

Insinuating that you could be something else in the future. Insinuating that his mind had wandered in the same direction as yours, at some point in time.

“Okay,” you murmured softly, resting your head against his shoulder. “That’s okay.”

As friends, you found momentarily solace in each other, while the wind howled outside.

“The way I see it? The company doesn’t give two flying fucks.”

Johnny’s voice rang out across the room, ever loud and thunderous like the titan himself—despite a mouthful of McDonald’s fries and ice cream. A chorus of hushed and panicked voices followed immediately.

“Seo, you better shut your fucking mouth.”

“Ew, John you got spit on me!”

“Dispatch would have a field day with this one.”

“Can’t take this man anywhere, I swear,” Doyoung rolled his eyes, leaning over to snatch a chicken nugget from your tray. Just as quickly, you wrestled it out of his hand and shoved it into your mouth, your idol etiquette class be damned.

“Can’t take you anywhere either,” you scoffed, then pointed at Johnny with greased-up fingers. “As much as you need to learn how to shut the hell up when we’re in public, continue.”

He gave an indifferent shrug and kept shoveling vanilla soft serve into his mouth. Away from formal settings and the prying eyes of company seniors who expected utmost discipline, Johnny Seo was nothing short of an American frat boy pulled straight from a cliche American movie: most commonly seen in joggers and leisure wear, stumbling lazily over his words, eyes constantly half-closed like he was stoned out of his mind.

“I said, the company wouldn’t give two flying fucks if we, hypothetically, dated each other. Well, ideally they don’t want us to at all, but if it’s gonna be a dating scandal, best keep it between two people from the same agency,” he said, admittedly quieter now, but with a definitive thud of his empty sundae cup against the table as if to make a groundbreaking point.

“Yes, love, we’ve established that already, we can all read and already noticed that dating rules weren’t outlined in the contract,” Mina sighed from next to him, deadpan and feigning boredom. “Got anything more interesting to share?”

“Well obviously, I wasn’t finished talking,” Johnny huffed, but quickly continued when everyone jeered in annoyance. “Just think about the publicity. Fans love couples that make music together, they eat that shit up. So let’s say someone starts dating. Good for the company. Say nothing happens at all, for the entire length of our contracts. Also good for the company.”

“What if they break up?” Doyoung asked, skeptical. “Still good for the company?”

“Yes, because they’d say it was an amicable breakup in favour of both parties’ careers, get free publicity, get praised for being professional, and life goes on,” Johnny snorted. “We’re dealing with execs who will try to make money off anything you throw at them. They’re all capitalist pigs.”

Mina rolled her eyes. “You’re literally American.”

Johnny glared. “You have tea and crumpets for breakfast.”

“What if the couple’s gay?” you broke in before the two could start another squabble over their nationalities and British colonialism. If you were exploring hypotheticals, why not explore them all?

“I’m not gay,” Johnny said immediately.

“I never said you were,” you snapped. “I said what if.”

“Then they’ll never disclose it, the public is left to speculate, and fans make one hell of a tag on AO3. At the end of the day, nothing particularly bad for the company.”

Doyoung frowned, confused. “What’s aye-oh-three?”

“John reads gay fanfiction.”

“I don’t!”

Then the table descended into another war, and in the midst of the chaos, Doyoung ate your remaining chicken nuggets.

Still just a group of nameless, faceless kids at the corner McDonald’s, the four of you let your profanities and threats flow free. You all knew: things would change drastically in the coming weeks, and you wanted to hold onto this for just a little longer. Regardless of pending fame, regardless of possible successes or failures, it wouldn’t be every day that you ate fast food and caused mayhem in public this spontaneously. Nor insulted Johnny this freely, nor copied Mina’s British vulgarities in a near-insulting accent, nor curled up over Doyoung’s shoulders when you inevitably got tired.

How ironic it was, bringing yet another youthful, chipper idol group into the industry, when you’d sacrificed all your teenage years for this moment. While Doyoung carried you across the parking lot on his back, you thought back to when you’d put your pen to the paper and signed neatly in the little box they’d provided. It was hard to believe that it had happened only a few hours ago. Even your exit from the restaurant, barely five minutes ago, felt so far away. You were incredibly wired, overwhelmed, always overthinking.

You trekked back to the dorm by bus, Doyoung having relinquished access to his brother’s car, and your new manager not yet responsible for your every move and location, much less driving you places. You’d met him earlier in the day—a handsome, charismatic, 30-something-year-old who could easily debut himself if not for his age—hardly spoke, and quickly exchanged goodbyes. You could only hope that he would turn out about as easy-going as he looked.

It was past midnight when you arrived home: a modest building not too far from the company building, two small units split between the boys and girls. Soon after, Mina went out to the convenience store for ice cream, while Johnny went up to the roof to puff on his vape. You found yourself sprawled out on Doyoung’s bed, watching him browse internet deals on Coupang. It didn’t take long for you to make it to his side and slouch against him with your arms around his neck. It took only minutes for him to put his laptop aside and hold you properly. Barely a few moments for him to throw caution to the wind and kiss you.

Something about it felt more like a parting gesture than anything else. Like a silent and mutual agreement that this—whatever this was—would have to stop soon. Like you both acknowledged the lack of clear definition for your relationship, and that it was okay. Some part of you was envisioning everything that could go wrong from here. The other part of you fully trusted his judgement, and your own.

“Won’t be able to do this once Kibum moves in tomorrow,” he gave a breathless laugh several minutes later. But he sobered quickly enough, brushing aside a stray strand of your hair and whispering, “Probably shouldn’t, anyways.”

“Probably won’t have time,” you joked lightly. “Only four hours of free time a day? I’d rather be sleeping in those four hours, not sucking your face, thanks.”

“Not sure how we’ll survive that.”

“What, not sucking face?”

He looked at you, clearly unimpressed. “No, only getting four hours of sleep every night.”

“Maybe even less than four.”

“Double stuff me in the ass.”

“Christ, Doyoung.”

Ever true to himself, he hurried to undo his vulgarities. He smoothed your hair down again, laughing quietly and murmuring in your ear, “Joking. I think we’ll be okay.”

Then he closed the distance between your lips one last time, gently taking your face in his hands to give you a proper goodbye.

We’ll be okay.

Those words carried more weight than he even knew, following you long after you parted. It was there when you finally retired to bed, still echoing when the lights went out—lulling you to sleep where you would have been tossing and turning in any other circumstance.

We’ll be okay.

IMG_4749.MOV from Mina’s iPhone

“Observe: Kim Doyoung reading his first fanfiction on AO3. It’s, um. A Harry Potter x Draco Malfoy ABO male pregnancy mafia kidnapping AU that ____ found—”

“WHAT THE FUCK?!”

“Read it out loud!”

“What the fuck am I reading?! ‘His fifteen-inch-long co—‘ JOHN YOUNGHO SEO, YOU DERANGED SON OF A BITCH!! IS THIS WHAT YOU READ IN YOUR FREE TIME—”

“We’re so getting fired if this video gets out.”

“Oh, definitely.”