Page 82 of When Worlds Collide
Five minutes later, I was standing outside of the door to Jihoon’s studio. Thankfully, the interior of the building was well signposted in both English and Korean, so I’d had no trouble finding it. There were no windows, but even so, I was temporarily transported back to all those times, so many months ago, where I would walk past studio three just to catch a glimpse of him.
Just like back at Pisces, there was a red light above the door, indicating the studio was in use, but unlike at Pisces, here there was a keypad to lock or unlock the door. Jihoon had texted me the passcode earlier, and I now keyed this in, hearing the lock click open. I pushed open the door, and poked my head in to look around. Jihoon was sitting in front of the mixing deck, headphones on, nodding in time to whatever he was listening to. Quietly, I let myself in and crept up behind him. I held my hands over his eyes, making him jump and pull the headphones off, just as I bent down to whisper in his ear, “Guess who?” But instead of pulling my hands down as I’d expected, he spun thechair around, knocking me off balance and pulling me into his arms at the same time.
I squealed as I was thrown off my feet and pulled into his lap, slapping ineffectually at his broad chest. He grinned down at me, pleased with himself.
“Jagiya,” he crooned. “How did it go?”
Panting slightly, I tried to gather my thoughts from where they’d scattered all over the floor. “Good. I think. She’s a tough cookie, that one.”
Jihoon snorted, and pulled me closer against him. “I bet she was putty in your hands.”
I laughed and said, “Hardly putty. I got the impression she thought I was kind of ridiculous.”
“Where is she, I’ll fight her!” He tensed, as if ready to stand and run off and make good on his threat, but I laughed and slapped at his chest.
“Calm down, caveman. She’s right. I am ridiculous. This whole scenario is ridiculous. But-” I held up my hand to cut off the defensive speech I could see bubbling up in him.
“-I think she may have been persuaded to give me a chance.”
He blinked at me for a moment, before a slow smile crept across his beautiful face, his eyes twinkling with the reflected shine from the overhead spotlights.
“I always knew I liked her.” He grinned down at me and impulsively I dragged a finger down his cheek. Impishly, he snapped his head to the side and caught my inquisitive finger in his teeth, nipping it gently.
“Ow,” I whined.
“Poor baby,” he murmured, reaching up to grasp my hand in his and pressing a gentle kiss to where he’d bitten the pad of my finger. I tried to ignore the sudden ache of desire that shot through me.
Clearing my throat, I asked, “So when can I hear what you’ve been working on?”
The predatory way he smiled told me he knew exactly what I was feeling, but obligingly, he spun the chair around and pulled up some tracks on the laptop perched on the deck. He handed me the headphones, and without moving from his lap, I pulled them over my head.
Immediately, Jihoon’s sultry voice blocked out all other sound. I listened, entranced. It was a very different sound from GVibes. It still fell into the ‘pop’ category, but it had a sharper, edgier feel to it.
Where GVibes often hinted at sensuality and attraction – I mean, hell, those body rolls weren’t exactly subtle – this felt like a more overt declaration. Hearing the way his voice wove intimately around the melody made my cheeks heat. If this was a rough-cut, the full production was going to be incredible, and I said as much as I pulled the headphones off to lay back on the mixing deck.
I craned my neck up to look at Jihoon who, to my surprise, was looking at me anxiously, like he thought I was going to criticise.
“Joon, it’s incredible. Your voice is amazing; it suits this track so well.”
“You think so?”
“Don’t you?” I cocked my head to the side, trying to see from his point of view.
He shrugged. “It’s different.”
“Different to GVibes?”
“Yes, and anything I’ve done before.”
“You think people won’t like it, because it’s different?”
“Sometimes, people only want the same thing that they first liked you for. The same sound, the same themes. When it’s different, they don’t always support it.”
“I think you should give Vibers more credit. You’ve been a part of their lives for years now. They’ll stand behind you.”
“For everything?” His eyes locked with mine, and I faltered. My silence said more than any words I could offer, we both knew there may be some things they couldn’t move past. A new sound? Sure. A girlfriend? Less certain.
The small studio seemed to echo with the sounds of our recent argument about this very topic, still so raw.
