Page 69 of A World Apart
“What?” She frowned. “Oh, well, no, but I am trying a new mousse.”
“It looks nice! Very chic, very trendy.” I might have been piling it on a bit thick, but she looked pleased.
“Thank you, love. Anyway, sorry to cut our call short, but I must dash. I’ve got an appointment, and your dad’s driving me.”
“What appointment?” Since moving away from home, I’d become weirdly nosy about my parents’ comings and goings.
“Oh, never you mind,” she said cryptically.
As my mum moved from the kitchen through the hallway to the front door, flashes of my childhood home appeared in the background, stirring a strange sense of nostalgia.
“Love, have you got your referral letter?” my dad’s voice called in the background.
“What referral?” I said loudly, trying to get my mum’s attention. She waved a hand at me impatiently.
“I’ll call you later, love. Kisses!”
She was still blowing kisses as the line dropped, leaving me staring at her WhatsApp profile picture.
Jihoon and I barely talked at all over the week GVibes was recording. They were so busy between vocal training and the actual studio time that our schedules rarely aligned, but we sent messages to each other through the day. Jihoon was especially guilty of sending multiple selfies a day, which never failed to cheer me up, or make me laugh, or more often, make me swoon, especially that one he sent from the makeup chair when GVibes was having a style consultation for the music video. He’d clearly been bare from the neck down, and while the photo he’d sent was a head shot, there had been enough revealed that sent my pulse skyrocketing.
K-pop companies had such a tight leash on their idols that even when they filmed content of the groups in pools, or beaches, they almost always covered them up entirely. This photo was a reminder that Jihoon wasn’t just an idol, he was a man. Not that I had needed the reminder, but I had needed to sit down afterwards.
One afternoon, a week after they’d wrapped recording, I was lying in bed, sick as a dog and having taken the day off. I was feeling a little miserable, when my phone buzzed with a text message from Jihoon.
Joon
I hope you’re feeling better.
[sent 15:12]
He must have just woken up. I’d texted him early this morning, when he would have been asleep.
Me
Not dead yet
Joon
Please don’t die. Watch this.
[sent 15:14]
The next thing he sent was a link, which I saw was a link to VLive. I’d watched the group’s lives before, but they normally filmed them in the evening, Korea time, so I’d watched the playbacks, once some clever iViber had put captions on, but it was still difficult to keep up with.
I clicked on the link, and it took me to a page that said, ‘loading,’ until a few moments later, Jihoon’s face appeared on the screen. He was sat at his studio desk, by the looks of the surroundings, with all his carefully-chosen anime figurines and the different coloured light strips along the back wall.
“Annyeonghaseyo!” he cheerfully greeted, waving a hand. Already the chat was filling up as people joined, having received the notification that Jihoon was going live.
“Annyeonghaseyo, good morning, everyone. I thought it would be nice to come on early to see you all before work or school. I hope you don’t mind!”
I smiled. Would it be big headed of me to assume this live was timed for my convenience?
Comments on the live were pouring in, the diversity of the languages being typed was immense, I recognised Korean, English, Spanish, French, and so many others I didn’t know. People from all over the world were tuning in to watch, even if they couldn’t speak the same languages. It blew my mind.
“What have you guys been curious about recently? Let me see…” Jihoon peered closer at the screen. I guessed he was reading through some of the comments.
He said something in Korean, and then in English. “We have just finished the new song, so please look forward to it, it’ll be out soon.”
