Only Chaeryeong

Part 12: Artist of the Month

Lillian's perspective:
It's been half a year since Chaeryeong and I had gotten together, meaning it's November, and my 10th month in Korea. Since it was both of our free-days, and it was our half a year mark for our relationship, we decided to have a small celebration, so we had decided to spend the day together, just the two of us. Chaeryeong and I were laying on the couch and had just finished her favorite movie.

"So... what did you you think of it? Did you like it?" Chaeryeong asked in a sweet voice.

"Mhm! I can see why it's your favorite!" I replied.

She was always happy when I was around, and it's been the same for me as well.

"I'm glad you performed at my school, we most likely wouldn't of been doing this." I whispered in her ear.

"Yeah, I'm glad as well! I still can't believe I'm in a relationship with someone I'm a massive fan of!" Chaeryeong exclaimed.

"Guess what?" I asked.

"What?"

"That makes the two of us. I'm a Midzy, yet I'm in a relationship with someone who's part of ITZY." I said, with a smile on my face.

"That is true, and you'll be mine forever, you cannot leave me!" Chaeryeong joked.

"Don't worry, I won't leave you, I wouldn't do it for anything!" I replied.

"Not even for multiple Chaeryeongs?" She asked, I could tell that what I said touched her heart a lot.

"Nope, there's only one of you, and even if I could be with two of you, then it wouldn't be anywhere near as special."

Chaeryeong smiled and blushed. "Fair point."

She began to mess with my hair, and I was dying to know what she was doing.

"What are you doing with my hair?" I asked.

"Relax, I'm just braiding it. I haven't seen your hair braided in person before, only on stream... and I think your braided hair looks really cute." She answered cutely. I was blushing a lot now.

I heard Chaeryeong get a notification. I don't know what it said, but it caused Chaeryeong to jump up, forgetting that I was on her lap. I fell to the floor.

"Ouch!" I said, only a tad bit hurt.

"Oop-sorry about that! I just got an email from someone, and I wasn't expecting it. I got excited and forgot you were on my lap." She apologized

"Who was it from?" I asked, only a tad bit jealous.

"Promise not to freak out?"

"Depends."

Chaeryeong showed me the email, revealing that we had won the Artist of the Month award, and they want us to put on a romantic performance. I listen an eyebrow at her.

     "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" I asked.

    "Lillian... we have by the end of this month, there's not enough time..." Chaeryeong responded.

    "Unless..." I said flirtily, causing her to blush as I was checking her out. "Would you be your for it?"

   "Oh, hell yeah!" Chaeryeong exclaimed. "It's about time, don't you think?"

    Chaeryeong and I were going to put on an unexpected and new performance for the Artist of the Month video, one that we didn't even have ready. But we had all month, allowing us to have enough time to remix another one of my songs, but this time, purely romantic. We both discussed what instruments to use, and we had decided to go with the Piano, and the Violin to make a romantic background music. We spent a few hours re-working the lyrics to one of my most popular songs ever, Love Me.

    Love Me is a song about someone who's in love with another person, and is fantasizing of that person, wishing they were with them even though they knew they could never be with them. So what Chaeryeong and I had decided to do, was remix the song lyrics next, making it more about two lovers who are too scared to confess to eachother. However, it ended up sounding a lot like another one of my songs, In Your Arms Tonight, so we just decided to make a duet version of it and use the piano and the violin.

    That night, we were both very tired, and had realized we spent a majority of our day working on music when it was our free-day, so we had decided to have fun that night before going to sleep. The next morning, we were both off again, so we had went to the training room and were practicing. The other members of ITZY walked in silently while we were practicing, so we didn't hear them until they clapped. Both Chaeryeong and I's faces were red and embarrassed.

    "So, whatcha working on?" Yeji asked.

    "Just a remix of a romantic song I made for our Artist of the Month award." Chaeryeong explained. I was too shy to speak at the moment.

"Ooh, sounds interesting!" Ryujin started. "I wish the two of you luck!"

"Thank you!" Replied Chaeryeong.

"If you're in the mood for a break, wanna go catch a meal? We're going to a sushi bar." Yuna offered.

Chaeryeong and I accepted the offer, but had to leave early to continue practicing the choreography, as the choreography had pushed us to our limits. As time went on, so did the up time until our performance. On November 25th, we had out performance. It took many shots because I kept on zoning out, but Chaeryeong and I managed to do it after I zoned into the music and into her moves, rather than out of reality. At dinner, we ate with the other members of ITZY

"You know Lillian, you should really go on tour sometime." Lia said, but I knew she was hiding something from the tone of her voice.

"Thanks! But, I'm not sure if it's a good idea to go on tour as of right now, I think I should wait a bit longer." I announced. Yeji handed me an envelope.

"JYP had told us to give it to you. We don't know what it says, he said he wanted you to open it." Yeji whispered, handing me the envelope.

I hesitated before opening it. I was prepared for the worst.

"What does it say?" Chaeryeong asked.

"Dear Lillian Norbu, I, J.Y. Park have an important message for you, I had entrusted it in the hands of ITZY to hand it to you, um-opened. Your performances of a soloist is fascinating, and your popularity have grown a lot this year, which is why, I have an offer for you. I would like to either give you a promotion of 10%, or, join a new group I'm forming called 'Soul', which will be a 3 member group. If you join Soul, you will have half as much free time, however, you will get payed not only as a member of the group, but also as the group's choreographist, and their music composer."
"Upon accepting the invitation to Soul, you will also get a new dorm that is significantly larger, but will have to share the dorm with the two other members. You will still be able to have your girlfriend, Chaeryeong over, but you'll have to be careful about what you do with her. To explain Soul more, Soul has three members, still to be chosen, and I want to gender to be neutral amongst the three members, which makes you an even greater use, being the only non-binary person who works for this company as far as I'm aware of. There'll also be a female member, and a male member. Amongst joining Soul, you will not have to re-sign any previous contracts, or sign any new ones."
"The choice is yours, Lillian. Sincerely-J.Y. Park."

We all sat in silence for a few minutes before we started talking again.

"What's your choice?" Asked Lia.

"Lia! Give her time to think on it!" Shouted Yeji.

"No, it's fine." I blurted. "I already made up my mind. As big of a use I'll be to Soul, It'll take too much time out of my already packed schedule. I'm staying a soloist."

I folded up the paper.

"You sure? I don't want to get in the way of your career." Chaeryeong commented. I nodded my head.

"I'm sure. I've never really been one to work in a group of musicians. I like the freedom of being a soloist, I don' have to follow the group's theme, I can just make the music I want, they way I want." I said, glaring lovingly into Chaeryeong's eyes.