Page 76

Twenty-nine

I wake up the next morning with red, puffy eyes, beneath a pile of stuffed animals. The low whir of a vacuum travels from below, the sound of which must have woken me. Unearthing my phone from beneath Medium Totoro, I text Ajumma.I’m not feeling well. I’m going to stay in my room today.

She doesn’t respond, but a half hour later there’s a knock on my door.

Ajumma enters carrying a tray with a covered stone bowl and a glass of water. Placing the tray on the side table, she presses the back of her hand to my forehead.

“You don’t have a fever,” she says, clicking her tongue.

“I just have a headache...”From crying myself to sleep.

“Mm-hmm,” she says. She hands me two white pills, which I plop into my mouth, then the glass of water; I gulp, swallowing them down.

She doesn’t ask about my swollen eyes or where Nathaniel is, though she must have noticed his empty bedroom. I’d gone into the room last night, crying anew when I saw his neatly made bed; the room was spotless, as if he’d never been there at all.

I only have myself to blame.

“I’ll come check up on you later,” Ajumma says, smoothing my hair back from my face.

When she leaves, I lie back on the bed, dizzy with thoughts, which only serves to intensify my headache. Had I acted too rashlythe night before? Nathaniel and I had kept the fact that he was staying at my house a secret for two weeks, wecouldhide a secret relationship, at least until Hyemi’s scandal has quieted down.

No, I’m thinking with my heart, not my head.

The risk is too high, the consequences of getting caught too great. I need to be the reasonable one, even if that means making the hard decisions and breaking both of our hearts.

Nathaniel will be fine. He has his bandmates, his family.

He doesn’t need me, not like my mother needs me.

When I decided to help Hyemi, it was partly to prove to my mother that I could be trusted to make my own choices with my career, but it was also because I wanted tohelpher,to ease some of her burdens.

She would be horrified to know all the things I’ve done that would prove to her the opposite, starting with inviting Nathaniel to stay with me.

I couldn’t do the two things she asked of me: staying away from Nathaniel and preparing Hyemi for debut. Director Ryu said that the secret to an idol’s success isn’t just practice and talent, but also the support of the people around them, that gives an idol their strength, that helps them to endure difficult times.

I’ve failed Hyemi on so many levels. Maybe I couldn’t have prevented that anonymous poster from leaking that story, but I could have prepared Hyemi for the consequences, if it should happen. I could have told her that her father made a deal with Joah instead of hiding it from her. But I was afraid she might quit if she knew the truth, taking her father’s money with her.

I’m flooded with guilt that I quickly suppress.

Mentally, I form a hardness around my heart. Maybe this is who I am. It’s who my parents are, after all, and I’m their daughter.

I pull myself out of bed to brush my teeth, because one can wallow but also have good oral hygiene. Turning my phone on silent, I grab my laptop and climb back under the covers. Opening up Netflix, I click on the first episode of the newest Hong Sisters drama, because I’d rather watch fictional characters deal with their innumerable, and sometimes fantastical, problems than deal with my own.

I’m on episode six, the computer completely turned on its side, and me along with it, when an invitation for a video call pops up in the right-hand corner.

Your roommate, the caller’s ID says,Go Jooyoung. Jenny.

I sit up. The laptop starts to fall off my four-poster, and I make a grab for it, my fingers inadvertently pressing the keypad.

Jenny’s face appears, illuminated by a ring light.

“Sori?” She’s in her dorm room. Behind her is a bookcase and her cello on its stand. “Are you sleeping?” Her gaze travels to the corner, as if checking the time. It’s one o’clock.

“Oh, Sori. That bad, huh?” Does she somehow know about Nathaniel? “I heard about the trouble with Joah.”

“How did you know?” I ask. Then I realize Jaewoo must have told her. I shift the computer so that she’s looking at me and not my ceiling.

“Never mind that,” she says. “I was worried about you.”