#i mean the music is unoffensive and if you like it that's fine obviously

[cahootings]

really coming to resent noah kahan because algorithms are trying to tell me I like him and are not understanding that I do not. I need my folk to be weirder. begone normie

[jenobloom]

WHY DO I BOTHER? (Chapter 1)

Kia Weon is a newly born idol, fresh from debut, and she hates her image. Her debut didn’t do too well so now Pledis have decided that she will be the one to provide vocals for Seventeen’s newest song ‘Q&A’ and in the process she makes 12 new friends but one enemy. A relationship becomes a thing that happens and a huge change in her career puts friendships on the line.

Word count: 3,141 words

Warnings: None

A random (and probably boring) thing I’ve started working onnn, not super sure where this is gonna go but hey, it’s a work in progress so feel free to suggest things.

I quickly scanned my appearance over in the full-length mirror outside the door to the recording studio once more to make sure that I looked presentable. My thin black oversized Monsta X long sleeved shirt with Changkyun’s stage name and birth year on the back of it hung loosely from my small, short frame and stopped at mid-thigh and was paired with a pair of short black bicycle shorts that were hidden under the shirt to prevent accidental flashing, worn black combat boots and one of Hoseok’s long leather chokers wrapped around my neck; the dark clothing contrasted pleasingly with my bright violet hair and my pale, makeup-less face was half hidden by a black cotton mask.

“Okay Kia, you can do this.” I breathed before walking quietly in to the studio, a smile forced on to my lips as I nervously walked in to the room despite nobody being able to see it.

The room was tiny, a small sofa was stuffed in to one corner of the room and a desk with a few monitors, medium sized white speakers and other complicated looking studio equipment was pressed against the recording booth wall about a step away from the sofa. Perched stiffly in the chair in front of the desk was a guy with a blonde undercut hairstyle and, like my own, his hands were tucked in to the cuffs of a black oversized hoodie to form sweater paws while black skinny jeans that had been rolled up at the ankles hugged his legs, complimenting his thin build. A pair of large rounded glasses were perched upon his nose and shielded his eyes that were slightly turned upwards at the ends due to his inviting polite smile, he nervously jumped up from his chair to greet me and was roughly only an inch taller than my small 5-foot 3 frame.

“Hi, it’s nice to meet you. I’m Lee Jihoon, the producer, you must be Weon Kia?” He awkwardly introduced himself with a bow, nearly knocking in to me as he did due to how close together we were forced to stand.

“Yeah, I’m Weon Kia. It’s nice to meet you!” I bowed back awkwardly also, straightening up and looking at him once more. “Excuse my Korean and very basic etiquette, it’s been a while since I’ve had to speak the language so much and it’s also my first time back in Korea since I was 7 and so I’ve grown to the British ways.”

“That’s fine, what is your lunar age?”

The question caught me off slightly, I knew it was a simple and unoffensive question however, my mind was still slightly accustomed to the western ways.

“Um… I’m 17?”

“19, shall we make a start on recording?”

I silently nodded, finding the atmosphere to be slightly thick and conversation awkward, placing my phone and earphones on the desk beside Jihoon and slipping in to the small recording booth, pulling the headphones on to my head then sliding my facemask to sit on my chin so it didn’t muffle my voice. I stared at Jihoon as I waited for him to tell me what to do next, feeling uncomfortable in the silent room as I was still only a rookie in the huge world of idols and so I still had to get used to the atmosphere of recording booths.

“Okay, could you say or sing something in to the mic please to test that everything is working?” Jihoon’s authorative voice flooded the silent room, making me panic a little as I realised that he was putting me on the spot as a younger looking boy walked in to the room and perched himself on the small grey sofa. Out of panic I began to rap Jooheon’s first part in the song Interstellar, nervously laughing as I noticed how it threw Jihoon off a little as his eyebrows rose and his eyes widened slightly before focussing on one of his screens.

“Okay so the mic works, let’s go!”

Gulping once, I cleared my throat as the familiar music began to play from the headphones. The recording process flowing smoothly, Jihoon only having to correct me on my pronunciation and pitch a handful of times before I was able to step out of the booth and was faced with the newcomer of the room who had been staring at me for the 20 minutes that I sang.

“Hello, I’m Weon Kia, it’s nice to meet you!” I bowed and smiled politely to the boy who looked to be my age.

“Hey, I’m Lee Chan, nice to meet you also!”

His smile was incredibly inviting, flanked by slightly chubby cheeks that gave his face a super cute shape; not too rounded but also not too sharp. His deep brown eyes were framed by a pair of rounded, thin gold framed glasses and his grey/blonde un-styled hair flopped over them gently. We took a seat back on the sofa and listened intently as Jihoon played the nearly finalised song over the speakers with my voice finally filling the gaps that were there previously, noting down things that would need to be adjusted to improve the quality of the song. My fingers played nervously with the earbuds of my earphones that now rested in my lap on top of my phone, producing a clinking noise when they occasionally hit the screen and causing me to cringe as I was aware of Chan’s attention being drawn to me.

“So…have you debuted yet?” His first word dragged out awkwardly to initiate a conversation as he shifted in his seat to face me better.

“Yeah, I didn’t do as well as expected though which is why Pledis are getting me on as many things as possible. They’re worried that their money will get wasted if I don’t pick up views and fans and stuff like that.”

“Oh, I’m sure you’ll do great! It just needs time; would you mind if I saw your debut video?”

I winced a little at the question, cringing as I realised how rude it would be to flat out refuse the boy. Despite my brain protesting completely against it, I plugged my earphones in to my phone and pulled the music video up for my debut song ‘ice cream cake’, handing Chan both my phone and an earbud as I put one in to my own ear before pressing play and settling my gaze on his face to watch for reactions. Confusion flashed across his features as he recognised me among the back up dancers, the confusion intensifying as he took in the lyrics, dance, video concept and my general appearance; the pastel appearance and soft voice obviously contrasting to my out of work look. He bobbed along softly to my voice and the beat and eventually gave the phone and earbud back to me once it had ended, he didn’t say anything straight away, he almost hesitated with his words as he looked back up at my face, seeming like he was considering his words carefully as to avoid offending.

“I liked it! It’s just…is that actually you because you seem so different in person an-“

“Lee Chan, you can’t speak to her like that!” Jihoon snapped like a parent would, swivelling in his chair to shoot the younger boy a disapproving look as Chan’s question fell upon his ears.

“No, I didn’t mean it like that! I’m sorry if it came across that way but-“

“It’s okay, honestly. I understand what you mean,” I let out an awkward laugh, my cheeks warming up a little as I caught Chan’s wide eyes. “Pledis thought I wouldn’t be able to work the ‘bad girl’ look so they’ve given me the whole bubble gum act, I don’t enjoy it at all, it’s far from my true self. Dark clothing, rappers and more thought out, artistic lyrics and music videos are my type of thing. The only thing I like about my debut song is the wordplay and I look fairly okay in baby pink clothing,” I glanced over at Jihoon and back at Chan, the younger of the two looked to be deep in thought, “is there another question you want to ask or…”

“I’m sorry if this sounds extremely rude but what’s your nationality? Because you don’t look like you’re from Korea, but you pronounce everything so well but you also have an accent of some kind and I’m a little confused, you don’t have to answer but I’m curious.”

“I’m British, I was born in Korea and so I speak fluently but I moved back to England with my parents to be closer to the other members of my family when I was 7 so I’m a bit rusty with the language and how Korea works. I’m pretty sure it’s the only reason I was accepted in to training too.” I chuckled lightly at his question, it was a question I would frequently get so it didn’t offend me in the slightest and only amused me as I gave him my scripted answer that I usually saved for TV.

“I see, so you’re here to stay now then?” I nodded, taking note of how his squishy cheeks were now dusted with a light pink colour. “Would you like to come back to the dorm for lunch?”

My eyes widened a little at how straight-forward he was being, his hands that were wrapped in the oversized sleeves of his orange top in insecurity flew up to hide his reddening face as I began laughing, any awkwardness from this morning washing away as I realised that these boys were just as bad at interacting with others as I was.

“I-I mean, like, because I thought it would be nice for us all to get to know each other and stuff? Like you can meet Seungchol and Vernon who are on this track alongside you and that kind of… thing.”

“I appreciate it,” I giggled and gently pulled his hands away from his face to make eye contact with him. “I’ll take the offer, it would be nice to make some more friends here. I don’t have many at the moment.”

“Jihoon hyung, will you be joining us?”

The hard-working blonde ripped his eyes away from the screen once more for a few seconds, seeming to have only just caught what was being said to him, his hands never leaving the keyboard and mouse however as his head turned to greet our now standing selves.

“No thank you, I’ll grab something later. Kia, I’ll text you when the song is ready for you to hear so you can come and listen to it.”

“thank you,” I bowed a little and earned a small smile back before following Chan out of the studio door, bringing my mask back over my mouth and nose.

The walk to the Seventeen dorm from the Pledis building was short, nothing was really said between me and Chan other than him informing me that the other boys would all be at home as they don’t usually do much on their days off other than game or sleep due to their tiring schedule, which I fully understood being an idol fresh from debut, before he then gave me a quick run through of everyone’s names and how to recognise them so I would feel less intimidated by the 11 boys that I had not yet met.

“Ready?” Chan offered me a small smile as his hand rested on the door handle to their 5th floor apartment.

I only nodded in response, my hands instantly slipping in to my oversized sleeves to wrap themselves back in to sweater paws which offered me a sense of security, we could already hear loud music being played from the living room in the other end of the apartment but as soon as the front door opened a male that was a head and neck taller than me appeared from one of the rooms closest to the front door in only his tight-fitting black boxers, his hair a fluffy brown mess as he rubbed his eyes sleepily and looked over before realising that Chan wasn’t alone, his eyes widening nearly as much as mine in shock. My hands quickly flew up to my eyes to shield them from the stupidly attractive male towering in front of me and I bowed before squeaking out a rushed greeting.

“H-hello, I’m Weon K-Kia, nice to meet you!” I stayed bowed until the shuffling in front of me stopped, straightening up and peeking between my fingers I saw that the male had quickly threw on a baggy t shirt that he must of grabbed from one of the bags of clothes conveniently laying in the hall and was now stood with a bright red face and his hands crossed in front of his hips.

“I’m Kim Mingyu, I’m sorry about being underdressed, please forgive me.” He bowed in both greeting and apology, eventually straightening up and looking down at me, smiling gently with a blush dusting his cheeks before turning to Chan who was currently trying to control his laughter. “The others are in the living room if you hadn’t already heard, Soonyoung and Seungkwan are hyper and Seungchol has given up on trying to calm them down.”

He quickly slipped back in to the room that he had just come from before Dino led me in to the living room, a wide smile cracked my face as two boys who I assumed to be Hoshi and Seungkwan were dancing energetically to TWICE’s song Ooh Ahh, getting the choreography perfect, so I ran over and stood next to the boy with blonde hair, ensuring there was enough space for us to dance without hitting each other. All 3 of us sang and energetically danced along perfectly in time and tune with the song, the others all cheering, clapping and laughing as they watched us perform and when the song ended the brown-haired male squealed before picking me up in a bone-crushing hug and span me around.

“Oh my god, Weon Kia is in my dorm and she danced with me!” He screamed, still not letting me go as he placed me back on the ground. “I love your song, I know the choreography and all the words!”

His fanboy side shocked me a little but I pulled him back in for a tight hug, I rarely get the chance to meet fans or gain compliments but when I do I have to distract myself from tearing up; I may despise the song and my image however I still worked hard to debut and make my song a hit so it was amazing to know the late nights and crazy diets had worked.

“Thank you, we should dance to it together!” I excitedly suggested, him nodding frantically before running over to the phone that was plugged in to the speakers and selecting my song then standing in place, the blonde-haired boy from before also joined us as well as Chan and another brown-haired male with a wide smile.

I was in awe for the whole song, shocked at how well the 4 males knew the dance and enjoying how feminine they seemed while doing it, as the song ended we all collapsed with laughter. Finally, introductions were exchanged around the room and I learned that the blonde boy who I danced with was Soonyoung, the fanboy was Seungkwan and the wide-smiled guy was Seokmin, I was also finally introduced to Seungchol and Hansol (who had the most charming smile in my opinion), Jun who seemed to be extremely sweet, Jisoo who greeted me in English after I mentioned that is was the language I was most comfortable with (Hansol also switching to speak to me in English), and finally Wonwoo and Jeonghan who had emerged from the kitchen armed with a plate full of sandwiches. I was sat comfortably on the floor with crossed legs between Hansol and Jisoo, nibbling on a ham sandwich and sipping on my apple juice as I enjoyed the conversation of the entire group and laughing when a petty argument started up between Seungchol and Soonyoung about why the group couldn’t get a puppy and how Soonyoung should just be happy with Mingyu, everyone had been so engrossed in the argument that nobody noticed when a new male entered the room until he sat next to Jun and grabbed a plate, wide smiles were exchanged between everyone before his eyes finally settled on me and confusion took over his face, his deep brown eyes glancing at me over the top of his glasses.

“Hi, I’m Weon Kia, it’s nice to meet you!” I bowed as well as I could in my seated position with my sandwich still in my hands and waited for him to introduce himself.

“Xu Minghao, nice to meet you also.” He hesitantly introduced himself before turning towards Jun and speaking quickly in what I recognised to be Mandarin in a hushed tone. “Who is she?”

Annoyance coursed through my blood at the rude man as he carried out one of my biggest pet peeves.

“I’m a singer/rapper that has just debuted, Chan invited me over for lunch and to meet everyone because I’m working on a song with Jihoon and I’ve not been here for long. I would prefer it if you would address me when you have questions rather than trying to speak to another individual in a language you thought I didn’t know, it’s politer.” I shot back quickly in his native tongue with a slightly harsh voice, the chatter dying down as people turned to look between Minghao, Jun and myself as they realised that something was happening; the two Chinese members looking shocked.

“Is everything okay?” Seungchol asked as he noticed the tension that had formed.

“Yeah… did you know Kia can speak Mandarin?” Jun broke from his trance and laughed nervously, Minghao only shooting me a slight glare before digging in to his own sandwich and staring at the floor with squinted eyes as if it was suddenly the most interesting yet offensive thing in the world.

“Hey that’s not fair, now she can have secret conversations with China line!” Soonyoung whined with a pout dressing his face.

“…Did you just call us China line?” Jun looked slightly taken back and placed his sandwich on his lap, comically placing his hands on his hips and glaring jokingly.

I giggled loudly, realising where he must have found the ship name before lecturing him.

“You shouldn’t be on Tumblr, that’s like breaking yours fans trust!”

“…Mingyu, did you know that you and Wonwoo would make an extremely cute couple?”