Blessed-Cursed: A SunSun Story

Epilogue: A Heart Throb

Everything had moved so fast.

Once the team was formed, we were trained with lightning speed. It helped a lot that we were in a relatively good place as units before we even began.

I hadn't "officially" sung with Jungwon and Jake, as in performance other than karaoke. At least, not as I had Beomgyu and Taehyun, but we blended well together and it worked really well.  It turns out Heeseung has a phenomenal voice - maybe even outshines us all. Most of the dance unit stayed together to join our team.  Yeonjun and Beomgyu were signed with another group - but that's another story.

The management knew from the beginning that Sunghoon and I, as well as Jake and Heeseung, were officially together.  Jungwon and Jay were...just, long story. They asked that we keep that to ourselves, keep it distant and away from our fans.  "They need to know you're available - that you could be theirs." I know that I'm pretty, but I was far more concerned with Sunghoon. He's used to seeing me more or less flirt constantly. That's just how I am.  It's not even intentional. But that's not what I'm used to with him, and I was really worried about how I'd feel.

"You don't have to stay far away from each other," our manager told us, "it's just that displays of affection need to be solely limited to your time in the dorms.  Also sitting at safe distances at events like fan signs or awards shows or vlives - that's important because nothing feels more natural than grabbing one another's hand when you're laughing or giving a peck on the cheek because they said something cute. We have to avoid that accidentally happening at all costs."

The closer the time to debut came, the more the managers' primary concern shifted from "but will they be good?" (because we were incredible), to "but will fans notice the couples? Will it cause problems?"

One day as we were meeting and finalizing the rehearsals for our debut showcase, I noticed one of the performance directors watching us closely.  I had thought it was just to make sure that we were performing in sync, correctly, the way that they envisioned us. But I noticed his eyes were focused solely on Ni-Ki.

After the rehearsal we headed back to our new dorms. We adjusted fairly well to the new surroundings, but they had us all in twin beds - bunk beds at that - which was super weird for me and Sunghoon, not to mention my ACTUAL bed was phenomenal. 

We were all exhausted and our debut was just days away. I plopped down on the couch next to Sunghoon and draped myself across him. I felt his hands run through my hair and he kissed me on the forehead. "I know, it's really exhausting," he said, "But everything's going to work out and it's going to be amazing".

I sat up, turning to look at my beautiful boyfriend.  "I know that," I said, sounding more confident than I actually was, "it's going to be amazing. But...I hate hiding" I felt my eyes tearing up, "I've never hidden who I was.  The thought of not being able to be near you unless we're at home?? It's going to be really hard".

"It is," Sunghoon agreed, "we just have to make our time together count."

I nodded and leaned back against him, feeling his arms wrap around me in a big hug, laying his chin on my shoulder. "I mean it, Sunoo," he said, "everything is going to be okay."

As he spoke the front door flew open and in walked our managers and the performance director. "Sorry to interrupt guys, but we need to just run over a few things,"

Sunghoon, not about to lose the time we were 'allowed' to be together, laced his fingers with mine and headed to the table where our team sat. 

"We have it figured out," our manager said, "It doesn't mean that we aren't going to have to be really careful about the four of you - "he gestured to me, Sunghoon, Heeseung, and Jake," - but we can distract, and we've figured it out," he looked over at the performance director and nodded.

"Someone has to be the face of the group.  After watching you guys today, it became really obvious, even though he hasn't really been terribly outgoing... but if the fans are hyper-focused on you, the rest of it can fade into the background. So we need to really promote you at first.  It doesn't mean everyone else won't be just as important. It just means we need to train on how to step in, distract, etc, so...

Ni-Ki, you're going to have to be the heartthrob.  Do you think that's something you can do it?"

Ni-Ki looked around the table at the rest of us. We had all agreed that we wanted everyone to have equal attention, but the performance director wasn't wrong - we were struggling to do everything right all the time.

After studying all of our faces, Ni-Ki looked at the performance director with uncertainty.

"I....I guess??"

The performance director and manager looked at each other nervously and said "um...well..kinda?  Let's see how things look at rehearsal."

__________________

The next day as we had our final practice for our debut showcase, the performance director reminded Ni-Ki - "We need you, Ni-Ki. You have to be the heartthrob. Can you do it?"

Ni-Ki nodded and we began the rehearsal.  The manager and performance director looked at one another.

That'll work.

And with that, we became legitimate k-pop idols. In fact, you may have even heard one of our songs.  It was inspired by everything that happened with me and Sunghoon, so...

Go stream Blessed-Cursed. ;)