A Year to Change Your Lives

Chapter 31

Reader sat, with her knees drawn up and her back against the wall. Her cheek was held in her hand which rested on one of her elbows and she tried not to let her mind wander as she waited for her next instruction from the boys.

Four of her eternal companions were positioned in the middle of the rehearsal room that they'd been in since the morning and they were bickering. They'd been at it for some time, and although Reader had no earthly idea what they were saying, she knew it was about her and the now constant fight to bring her performance back up to the ranks of the Run BTS episode from a few days before.

As usual, the tempo of the argument would ebb and flow and at some point, quite without warning, they'd reach a conclusion, call her back up and begin working again, possibly exploring some other angle or offering Reader different motivation to consider when she performed.

Jimin squatted down on his heels, as though physically taking himself out of the four way conflict for a moment. Yoongi and Namjoon were in a different part of the building having their wardrobe fittings and Jungkook had been subtly banished yesterday as the other suspected he was hindering Reader's performance rather than helping. They had made very little progress since then and tempers were running high. On the boy's part because little else had been worked on for two days, not new choreography, not classic routines, not new songs and on Reader's part because it seemed that now any of her previous efforts were not good enough and she had absolutely nothing new to show them.

Laura came back in, ignoring the little crowd in the middle, who'd been there when she'd left and sat down beside Reader handing her the coffee she'd been to collect. She tipped an ear towards the boys for a moment then turned back to Reader. "They're just bickering."

"Yeah, thanks!" Reader rolled her eyes.

"Do they even know which song you're doing yet?" Laura asked, shooting her an apologetic glance.

"No, they think maybe Walk, but it won't be choreographed, at least not fully. Honestly, if they just want me to wander around the stage, what's the difference?" Reader said, exasperatedly. She'd been very patient over the last few days, doing absolutely everything that had been asked of her.

They'd cleared the room, left her on her own, brought in a bunch of different staff to watch a run through, given her tons of different thought processes to bear in mind, had her sing, had her not sing. She'd rapped again, she'd repeated the Bang Bang performance but they remained decidedly unimpressed with her. Reader knew they all needed to move on and soon and god knew she wanted a magic switch as much as they did but she was becoming tired and a little bored of watching herself alone in the mirror.

Reader stood and skirted around the boys, to stand in front of the mirrored wall and began running through some of their new routines with little noises in place of beats of music. She knew they could afford to lose more time than she could on the new dances, because whether or not she was going to do it with the X factor they were seeking, she was going to have to do it correctly at least. And in any case, their collective mind still had one foot in the door of their American tour which they would begin after their departure the next day. Reader was going straight to London, meeting Tae there and then they were all heading back to New York at the end of this week.

To amuse herself in their absence, Reader had a whole load of UK promotion to do including radio interviews, a live television appearance for the national lottery, broadcasting from Seoul and the final tour leg wardrobe sign off before the styling team moved on to the concepts for the autumn concerts, which they would be ready to present by the time the boys and Reader returned at the end of June.

There had been no question of Reader not joining them on their American tour. The self-imposed absence at the end of Asia, which had been catalysed by the club video appearing online but since then, Reader and Jungkook's good behaviour and the PR efforts of the HYBE team, meant that the rumours concerning their relationship had calmed down. At least, it would be as easy to find material suggesting she was in a relationship with any of them. As it was, she was unhappy enough about the short absence they would feel from each other. She never liked being apart from him, but particularly not when they were all frustrated with her refusal to turn out a better performance than she was.