Utopia ♡ Ateez OT8

ONE: new beginnings

My eyes look around the bedroom. The size of it impressed me. It was slightly bigger than my old studio apartment, but compared to the rest of the rooms in this apartment, it was the smallest. Or so I had been told, anyway. Other than the lounge area and entrance, I had seen nothing else.

The tall man who had picked me up from my old apartment had briefly introduced himself as Sunghoon, one of the managers. When we arrived at the new apartment, he took me straight to the room that would be my bedroom, telling me to make myself at home and 'the others' will be home soon before rushing back out the front door. I was left alone after that.

The room is nice enough. Decor is rather plain, very plain in fact - white walls, white bedding with a pale pink throw blanket at the bottom, light hardwood flooring with a beige rug, empty desk in the corner with a basic stool and a silver table lamp. There was a built-in wardrobe, chest of drawers, and bedside cabinet. It had the basics, which is all you really need, I guess, but it had zero personality. I can smell the faint smell of paint, which meant it had recently been decorated. I wondered what colour it had been before. As I sit down on the double bed I groan lightly, the past 48 hours had been crazy!

So my name is Luna, birth name is Younha but as a child I always pronounced it as Luna and the nickname sort of stuck. I was born in New York, in the back of my dads car by the side of the road to be exact! My parents said I was eager to arrive, and it was a fitting start to my life ahead as I always jumped head first without thinking. My current situation was a testament to that!

My dad was in the army, so we moved a lot. I had lived in many countries, got to experience a lot of different cultures and I had a rather unique childhood. I had always had a love for learning new things, exploring new places, so I adapted well every time we moved. I was 15 years old when my parents settled in London and my twin sisters Hyejin and Soojin arrived soon afterwards. When I was 18 years old and graduated from school, I decided to move to Seoul to continue my studies here.

Both my parents are Korean but neither of them were born or had even lived there. We would visit during holidays and it was vital to my parents that we were fluent in Korean too. I always loved when we visited so, for me it made sense to me to study here. My parents were incredibly supportive of my ambitions, and as hard as it was to move so far away from them, it was also the best decision I ever made. I excelled in my studies, made friends instantly and graduated top of my class. My dream job was always to teach languages and the fact I was fluent in many of them before I even began studying gave me an advantage, but after graduating, finding that dream job proved harder than I imagined.

3 weeks ago...

I am sitting in an interview to be a language tutor and translator. Excited to have my first interview for a job I had wanted for years, a job I had studied hard for. I had graduated from college the year before and I had struggled to find a job in the field I wanted. To pay the bills, I was working as a receptionist in a hotel. Honestly, I hated it, but I was grateful for a steady wage.

A week before, one of my old college professors contacted me to say an entertainment company had approached her. They were looking for someone to teach English as well as translating. She asked if I wanted her to put my name forward. I nearly dropped my phone telling her that of course I did as she laughed and replied she was glad because she already had. Within 24 hours, I had a call from the company itself asking me to come in for an interview.

I had no idea what the company was. I had been told in the interest of privacy they could not reveal the company until after the interview process. All I knew was this was a full-time job, working with a group. They didn't say if it was a boy group or a girl group, nor how many members there were, but it would provide accommodation and they would except me to travel as well. It was exactly what I wanted.