You Rock My World

Had he done something wrong?

"Everyone listen up! I have something to share with all of you!"

Everyone quickly stopped playing and turned to face Hongjoong. Hongjoong had a hard time not exploding with the news. A smile fought at his cheeks as he tried to stay serious.

"We've received an offer from a company to perform as an 8 person band."

Cheers rose up from the group and Hongjoong broke into a smile. Everyone waited for his next words.

"And the company is a pretttttty big one."

The members started to get annoyed at his dramatic antics.

"Just tell us already!" Yunho whined.

"Is that who you were talking to on the phone?" asked Yeosang.

"Ya! Hush and maybe I'll tell you!" Hongjoong snapped.

They quieted down quickly but not without annoyed eye-rolls.

"We were offered a spot at JYP!"

Now the group was really excited and everyone gathered around him, jumping together in celebration. They'd been trying to find a place where they could perform all-together and still have a good chance of success. JYP would be a pretty good option.

But as Hongjoong was caught up in the midst of the celebration, he glanced up and noticed Seonghwa hadn't joined.

He slipped away from the mass and walked over towards him, confused.

"Hey Hwa, what's going on?"

"Nothing! I just didn't need to crowd you to celebrate our opportunity," he said with a somewhat forced smile.

Something was up. But Hongjoong didn't know what.

"Oh, okay. Isn't this great? I can't believe Sungjin from DAY6 has my number! Apparently they put in a good word for us after seeing both groups at the festival and JYP told him to invite us. He said we don't have to worry about signing right away, they just want to have a little trial run and get-together to sort of welcome us and let us see if we want to stay."

"Wow, that's pretty amazing," Seonghwa smiled but once again Hongjoong felt like it wasn't entirely genuine.

He didn't want to press in front of the whole group so he pretended not to notice but he made a mental note to check on him later.

He couldn't possibly think of a reason Seonghwa wouldn't be happy about their new opportunity.

"Alright everyone, let's finish out practice for today and then you all better get packing. It'll be a few weeks to let us figure out if we like it there so make sure you bring enough stuff with you, alright?"

"Yes, dad," Yeosang teased which caused the rest of the members to laugh as well.

Hongjoong remembered his statement about Seonghwa seeming like a mom and turned to relate with him but Seonghwa wasn't paying attention.

He really seemed to be bothered by something.

And it was starting to worry Hongjoong.

Had he done something wrong?