The Maknae Has to Be an Idol

—I’m sorry. I didn’t expect this to happen, but maybe it’ll be okay because I didn’t say any serious insults.

He was making up excuses to make up for it now. What on earth was there to insult me about? Did I hit him or bully or outcast him? Of course, there may have been some uncomfortable incidents between us, but I didn’t think it would warrant such insults towards me.

I also hadn’t gone around insulting Kang Hyun-Sung. I felt a surge of betrayal and my irritation towards him soared. Of course, he could curse me as he also had freedom of expression. But why did he insult me to a foreigner and Willy Freedman of all people? Wasn’t this a disgrace to the national image of Korea?

‘…What was he thinking?’ I stopped myself from thinking about —Then are you saying that the reason why it would be hard for you to introduce me to Willy Freedman is because he might hate me?

—There’s that too, but frankly, my position becomes weird. Won’t it be weird for me to introduce a person I insulted so much about?

—…

Yeah, that was strange. Even if I was Willy Freedman, I would think that Kang Hyun-Sung would be crazy.

—Can’t you just be considered a weird person to me?

I decided to retort illogically, and I wondered what kind of ridiculous situation this was. The reason why Kang Hyun-Sung couldn’t introduce me to Willy Freedman was because he insulted me to the man too much. In such a ridiculous situation, I thought it may make sense for me to retort with no reason or rhyme for my argument.

—Can’t you just think of it as payment for cursing me so much?

Kang Hyun-Sung didn’t answer for a long time.

—Perhaps, do you have time right now?

He suddenly asked me a question like this out of the blue.

—I’ll go where you are. Let’s talk face-to-face for a bit.

—What?

What kind of sudden development was this? Why was he suddenly coming to our dorm?

—I think we need to go through some steps before I introduce you to Willy. Won’t it be cleaner to have a reason for you two to meet than just introduce you out of the blue?

Oh, that meant he was going to introduce me to him in the end. But I still wondered why he was coming to our dorm.

—What does that have to do with coming to our dorm?

—Let’s film a challenge together. Willy tends to watch all the videos I post, so I’m sure I’ll get an answer from him.

A lightbulb lit in my head; I got what he meant.

—Okay, I understand. Then welcome inside.

—…

Was it because my attitude changed too fast? It was Kang Hyun-Sung’s turn to reply with a bunch of dots.

***

“Is this your dorm?”

“You have to leave before the other members come. Let’s film it as soon as possible and finish it.”

It was the first time that anyone other than the members, Ms. Seung-Yeon, and Ms. Hyuna stepped into our dorm’s front door, and that was why it felt even more awkward that Kang Hyun-Sung was standing in the hallway now. I looked at Kang Hyun-Sung with a slightly awkward gaze. Kang Hyun-Sung took a brief tour of the dorm with an expressionless face.

He said, “You live in a nice place.”

“The company gave it to us.”

“You have a good company.”

“Well, yes.”

We exchanged meaningless conversations like this. It was a huge relief that all the members were currently outside, or we might have had to shoot the challenge on the streets. Of course, the members could ask about the challenge video after it was posted later. However, receiving forgiveness was always easier than receiving permission.

After filming the challenge and posting it, I planned to tell them there was no good place to film the challenge video so we ended up doing it at our dorm. It was also true that we were filming it at home because there was no suitable place for us to film it besides our dorm. Where in the world could Kang Hyun-Sung and I go to suddenly shoot a challenge video at this time?

Woon and Dong-Jun were using the practice room below the dorm, so I had to cross the practice room off the list, and it was hard to find a practice room around here. The parking lot was also not a feasible place. Then at that moment, Kang Hyun-Sung put down his car key on the table as if he wanted to show it off. I moved my eyes in that direction.

It was the car key of a famous German imported car. Was it the new car he was telling me about? I didn’t expect him to be the type to flex like this, but I guess he was also a human in the end.

“I watched a few challenge videos before I came here, but please take a look at my dance to see if I did anything wrong.” With these words, Kang Hyun-Sung performed the choreography for the “Blue Ocean” challenge.

The choreography of “Blue Ocean” was characterized by the image of swimming. It invoked swimming movements by raising your arms all the way up and then stretching them back forward, and then extending your arms to the side as if cutting through the current. Depending on the rhythm, the foot and pelvic movements varied slightly.

However, the dance itself was not difficult so even ordinary people could quickly follow it after 30 minutes of practice. Although Kang Hyun-Sung said he briefly saw the challenge video before coming here, there wasn’t anything for me to correct.

“Nothing looks wrong to me.”

“Really?”

We decided to film the challenge video with Kang Hyun-Sung’s phone and play the music with my phone.

“You know when to go in, right?”

“Yes.”

“What should I do for the ending pose?”

“Can’t you just stay natural and smile and go out of the frame?”

“Is there any movement or gesture that Willy Freedman would like?”

“…There’s nothing like that.” Kang Hyun-Sung looked at me with slightly judging eyes.

But even I thought I sounded pretty desperate myself, so I couldn’t say anything to defend myself.

Kang Hyun-Sung said, “But change your clothes.”

“Ah, yes.”

I checked my clothes according to Kang Hyun-Sung’s request. It was just a white t-shirt and checkered pajama pants that I wore at home. It was a common high school boy’s pajama set that 5 out of 10 people wore when they walked on the streets. When I was about to change, Kang Hyun-Sung suddenly changed his words and told me to take the video in my pajamas.

“Should we just film the video while dressed up like that?”

“…What?”

“I don’t think it’s a bad idea.”

I was sure that he was trying to stand out by himself in the video. Right now, he was dressed up in a casual but cool style, and he even did light makeup by himself. I wasn’t skilled enough to do makeup by myself, but I thought I should still dress up. But once I tried to dress up, I didn’t know what to wear.

I hardly had any daily wear, and frankly, my members often coordinated or lent me their clothes. However, since all the members went out, I couldn’t take out their clothes and wear them without permission. I opened my closet and wondered what to wear.

“Can I take a look?” When Kang Hyun-Sung saw me taking my time, he stood in front of the closet himself. Then we tried to pick the clothes together. However, what he said after looking at my closet was…

“You have bad style.”

“…Don’t you usually say that behind someone’s back.”

“No, it’s not that you have bad style, but you don’t have many options.”

“…”

“Oh, that one.” At that moment, Kang Hyun-Sung pointed a piece of clothing in the corner of the closet. That was what we wore when we went out to The Showcase together. It was a sportswear set that Kang Hyun-Sung gave out to win the hearts of the team members during the joint mission.

“Do you want to wear that?”

“The training clothes? Then would there be a point changing from pajamas? I thought I had to change because our outfits are too different.”

“Then Ill change. We just have to match each other’s concept anyways.”

If I couldn’t upgrade, Kang Hyun-Sung just had to downgrade. Since it didn’t seem possible for me to do a casual dressed-up style, we were going to change to a comfortable homeware.

“But you don’t even have clothes to change into.”

“Give me what you’re wearing now.”

“What?”

“You can wear that training wear.”

“..Why do you want to wear something that I’m wearing? You can wear that training set.”

“That doesn’t fit me. Don’t you know there is a size difference between you and me?”

I looked at Kang Hyun-Sung. We were similar in height, but there were quite a few differences in areas such as shoulders and chest. Although not as much as Do-Seung, Kang Hyun-Sung definitely worked out, and I had a more slim physique with lean muscles.

“It looks like at least those pajamas are free size, and I don’t think you have anything else I can wear besides that.”

“…Yeah, that’s true.” Since he was right, I had no choice but to take off my clothes and give it to him. I had no thoughts about taking off my clothes in front of my members, but it felt weird to do so in front of people I was not close to.

So I said, “If you go out, I’ll take off my clothes and give them to you.”

“Didn’t we already see everything when we were doing the jacuzzi?”

“It’s up to me.”

“Oh…”

There had been a very awkward time when we talked to each other at the jacuzzi. Anyways, after I chased Kang Hyun-Sung out, I took off my pajamas and changed into a training suit. Then just in case my pajama had body odor, I sprayed Febreze and then handed it to him. Kang Hyun-Sung changed into my pajamas and stood in front of the mirror to check the fit.

‘…I should also exercise.’ When I wore it, the pajama had just looked like pieces of clothes to cover up my body, but on Kang Hyun-Sung, it looked like a fashion style, and he looked like he would appear in some kind of European magazine as a homeware styling concept.

Kang Hyun-Sung seemed to have liked the fit as he smiled with a sense of victory. Although he clearly downgraded his clothes, I felt a stronger sense of defeat. Perhaps, my previous state had been closer to an honorable death.

“Let’s shoot now.” The process to shoot took a bit longer than expected.

The two of us began filming the challenge video, and compared to our lengthy preparation time, we ended the video in one take. The movements were not difficult, Kang Hyun-Sung was originally good at singing, and the timing of the song was just right. I think I’ve done this dance challenge dozens of times so far, but it was the first time that I finished it so cleanly in one cut.

“It came out well.” Kang Hyun-Sung saw the finished version and said with satisfaction. I also thought this was good enough for me.

“So if you post this, Willy Freedman will watch it, right?”

“Yes, he will. He watches most of the things that are related to me. He would probably DM me after he sees it, asking me what I’m doing when he thought I had a bad relationship with you.”

“…That’s not great news for me to hear.”

“Well, I can start the conversation with that and try to cover up the insults I made before and set up a meeting.”

“A meeting?”

“Ah, Willy Freedman is coming back to Korea during his tour this time. Didn’t you know?”

“Oh, I think I saw an article, but I didn’t know Korea was also included in the tour.”

“Anyway, let’s watch it together when he enters Korea.”

Things were going more smoothly than I thought. If only I could get Willy Freedman to feature in our song or something more…

‘Then it’ll be possible to clear the mission.’ I could clear all the missions the system threw at me to fail. Then at that moment.

Beep-beep-beep-beep.

I heard the door lock password unlocking from outside.

“Hmm?”

“Crap.” I didn’t know the members would come back so quickly. No, it wasn’t quickly as it was 10 p.m. now, and it was time for them to come in. Was it because I was too flustered? Even though I could have just explained to my members and resolved the situation, my panicked brain couldn’t easily think of such a reasonable solution. Instead—

“Get in!”

“What?”

“Get inside!”

I pushed Kang Hyun-Sung deep inside the closet.