Page 53 of When Worlds Collide (Between Worlds #2)

W eeks passed until eventually it seemed that people had moved on from the footage leak. The online sphere seemed to have settled into an acceptance of the theory that Jihoon was currently seeing someone, and most news sources had now moved onto speculating who it was.

The main story they’d initially run with was that it had been someone working for Pisces.

Becka had confirmed they’d received countless press inquiries.

People had even been lining up on the street outside the building, taking pictures of people as they went in and out.

Eventually, they’d had to call the police to cordon off the building.

“It was a total shit show,” Becka moaned late one evening, mouth full of spaghetti.

“People kept stopping our engineers in the street, asking who had 'assaulted' Jihoon.”

“Assaulted!” I cried, appalled at the idea.

Becka just rolled her eyes. “Tell me about it. We got so many social media comments from people saying that no way would Jihoon willingly kiss some random worker, so he must have been assaulted.”

I was speechless. I didn’t know whether to be insulted or amused. Both, I think.

“Little do they know.” She waggled her eyebrows at me.

“You’ve got sauce on your chin.” I’d pointed out.

The most popular theory was, of course, Lee Hyejin. It wasn’t helped by the fact that PYT had no public performances in the week of the time-stamped footage, so publicly it couldn’t be ruled out.

ENT were choosing not to address this rumour to confirm or deny.

For some, this was tantamount to a confirmation of the identity of the woman on the tape, and as was to be expected, Lee Hyejin was taking some hits because of it.

Interestingly though, their latest album had well over-sold what had been expected of them, and their streaming records had earned them a double platinum.

Although to be fair, their new song was very catchy.

Even I had to begrudgingly admit to the brilliance of the arrangement.

The scandal helped, there was no doubt about that, but it would have done well in any case.

It made me feel entirely too cynical to see how well PYT and GVibes were doing off the back of the rumour, and yet how poorly Lee Hyejin was being treated as a result.

The whole thing was fucking ridiculous, and I couldn’t wait till the day I woke up and it wasn’t the first thing I thought about.

“Will you stop, already?” Hana snapped.

“Sorry,” I muttered distractedly, not at all repentant for the way I kept bouncing up and down on the balls of my feet. We stood elevated on a platform of portable staging, where we’d helped set up the sound tech earlier that morning.

Mr Park had specifically requested that I be on the team of assistants, thanks to my experience with the equipment – from another life where I’d always imagined myself behind the soundboard, not hauling cables for it.

We’d only found out this morning that we were being sent out to a venue in the city where GVibes was going to be performing a variety set – a collection of songs from their different albums.

I’d known for ages that Jihoon was performing today; I’d seen his schedule. But I was only here because the other junior sound tech had broken their leg.

Hana had gotten to come along because they needed her to interpret for me. I’d have thought she’d appreciate the chance to see GVibes perform, but instead she’d bitched all morning about the hard work, acting like I’d drawn the easy job by helping with the sound rig.

Now, we were both stationed at the sound booth, just in case the actual engineers needed a hand.

It was silly, but I was still so hyped to see the group perform live. I’d only ever seen them perform on a stage once before. Even though that was my boyfriend up there, when he was performing his persona took over. It was Jihoon… but not.

As I checked my watch for the umpteenth time, I wondered if this part would ever wear off. I hoped it wouldn’t.

The venue wasn’t large – certainly not the stadiums they could easily sell out. It was an indoor sporting venue that the company had spent the past couple of days kitting out with staging, backing, sound equipment, and several thousand chairs.

The audience was comprised of a mix of competition winners, gold-tier fan club members and people who’d been selected from some complicated pre-registration lottery.

It was the kind of smaller performance they did a few times a year – a thank you to Vibers for their support. I thought it was kind of neat.

There was going to be a press event after the show. All kinds of publications had been invited, from established music journals to niche, online-only blogs. The aim was to promote their upcoming album, and to tease the tour they would be announcing in a couple of weeks.

“What does your boyfriend think of you lusting over five guys?”

Momentarily distracted from the roadies on stage setting up last-minute equipment, I turned to look at Hana, frowning. She wore a smile like a shark.

“Huh?”

Hana hooked a thumb at the stage. “You’re acting as nervous as a virgin on a first date.” She laughed.

“You have a weird sense of humour.” I shook my head, redirecting my focus to the sound engineers, who weren’t paying me any attention.

“Just observant,” she said easily.

I clapped loudly, wishing I had one of the Viber lightsticks that were waving enthusiastically through the crowd, individual sceptres of glowing lights that pulsed in time to the music, each remotely linked to a Bluetooth network that controlled the colour, and beat of light.

The GVibes light sticks were simple black rods with a clear dome on top, but inside was a ‘V’ designed to look like an old-fashioned neon tube. It was very cool.

I bet Jihoon could get me one, if I asked.

I had to tamp down my enthusiasm. If I’d been just another face in the crowd I could have gotten away with screaming, singing along, waving my very own lightstick. But I was working, so I could only really clap and stand there.

It didn’t matter. Inside, I was fangirling hard.

The members were giving everything they had, even though the crowd was comparatively small.

They had chosen a selection of their most popular, most energetic songs.

The auditorium practically shook from the sound, the cheers, the feedback loop between performer and fan.

You could feel it – the electricity, the reciprocal pulse as though the crowd shared a heartbeat with the members.

It was pure joy.

It didn’t matter how many times I’d seen them practice these routines, seeing them up on that stage was like seeing it for the first time.

It was less precise, less on point, but not because they were less focused.

It was because they were more given over to the frenetic, almost chaotic charge of a live stage.

They often broke formation to get close to the edge, waving at the crowd, playing with each other, or just to bounce around in the way we had gotten used to seeing from them.

Watching them like this, it was so clear this was everything to them.

Their purpose, their happiness. Everything.

I loved it for them.

While I did enjoy watching their precise, practised movements, so full of tiny details and unspeakable feats of bodily discipline, there was a special kind of joy in watching the way they allowed it to fall to the wayside in favour of sharing that joy with the crowd. It was the best kind of inclusion.

They spent almost as much time talking with the audience as they did performing – and the crowd ate it up. They spoke mostly in Korean, of course, but there were moments when they also spoke in English. The performance was being filmed, so it made sense to include their international audiences.

There was one interaction between Minjae and Joon that sent the thousands in attendance into a near-hysterics.

“Don’t you guys think Seoul looks beautiful in the snow? I wish we could show everyone in another country how the city looks right now,” Minjae said, looking straight into the camera that was following them around the stage.

“Do you know what I think looks better, Jae?” Jihoon said, holding his monogrammed mic close to his lips, as he looked into the camera from beneath his lashes. From the slightly shy twist to his mouth, I knew what was coming.

“Vibers,” he said – and when the auditorium predictably erupted in delighted screams, he lifted a hand to cover his mouth, his eyes crinkling.

I don’t know how one person managed to flirt with several thousand people at the same time, but he executed it perfectly.

While I watched the performance with barely contained excitement, Hana watched with something akin to professional curiosity. Her expression was almost clinical – the same kind of detached appraisal I’d seen from managers in the practice rooms.

Given her ambition, I supposed that made sense.

Still, it seemed a shame she wanted to control something she didn’t know how to enjoy.

Later, Hana and I stood well out of the way at the side of the stage, which was now well-lit and occupied with a long table and five chairs.

The earlier audience had long since been ushered out, collecting small bags with token merch as a thanks for attending.

Hana and I had snuck looks this morning.

The bags contained photo cards, little boxes of sweets, pins, a bracelet and some full size products from the skin care brand that GVibes was sponsored by.

Unfortunately, there hadn’t been any spare bags, but that hadn’t stopped Hana trying to filch one.

I’d stopped her. She’d put it back, calling me a ‘kill joy’.

Now we watched as the press took their seats, noisily shuffling papers and setting up their electronic devices in a mind-boggling array of precise set ups.