lilacs & lotuses | seungkwan x oc x key |

十一

Nodding his head rapidly, Seungkwan had almost forgotten about the two other people in his company, too caught up in the situation.

"Alright then, I don't have much time so we'd better head off quick."

Waving their goodbyes (Seungkwan repeatedly bowing towards the other two) as they walked away, Minhui led the boy to a large, nearby building, where the sound of trumpets and cymbals could be faintly heard through the walls.

"Welcome to the Music college," Grinning, she gestured for him to pick up the pace, navigating through a large main entrance, up a flight of stairs, and down a narrow corridor, opening the door to dark room.

After switching on the light, everything was much clearer. The room was divided with a windowed wall into two areas, which Seungkwan guessed was one for the producer, the other for the vocalist. There was a desk which was the resting place to some very expensive looking equipment with flickering lights of red, blue, green and white.

Minhui, as if she was already familiar with the place, swivelled the chair around, falling onto it with a soft thump. Whilst she was tapping away on the keyboard, logging herself in, the boy awkwardly stood stiffly right beside the door entrance, not having dared move further into the room, scared that he would break a piece of irreplaceable equipment (which he definitely would not be able to afford).

Swiftly turning around on her chair, she looked at him, smiling enthusiastically. "Head on inside the booth, I'll guide you from out here"

Following her instructions instantly, he began to move his frozen legs, cautious of just about every single object around him. Being in the booth was definitely a new experience, it felt odd that there was a simple, large window between the two rooms and that there was simply just a microphone and a music stand sitting in the centre.

"So do I just, stand here?" Seungkwan had barely moved an inch towards the mic, both unsure and wary of the fact he had no experience.

Laughing, she spoke into the speaker from outside.

"Go just behind the mic, that'll be fine. You're here to sing Seungkwan,"

Still giving him an encouraging look, she signed for him to put on the pair of black headphones, fiddling with a few buttons and dials on the machines next to her.

"Wait a second, I'll play the song for you"

It didn't take a moment for the sound of a ambient guitar riff to sound through the headphones, surprising him.

"Just a quick warning, I had to make this demo with my voice, so I doubt it'll sound any good, that's why I'm trusting you with the vocals part."

Although he let out a light laugh at the comment, Seungkwan was secretly anticipating hearing her demo, wondering how many people had heard her sing before. Maybe only a few? What if he was the first? That would be an honour.

And boy was it not disappointing. Honestly, Seungkwan could not understand why she hadn't just sung the song herself, with her vocals she should've become a performing arts student. Pressured by not only the fact that he was singing over an original song but also how the demo singer was pretty much perfect made Seungkwan sweat a little, feeling a wave of heat momentarily overcome his body.

The song itself was, to him, was good enough to be released. Even at his previous university, when he worked with other music students, most of the time the songs were good, but he couldn't quite get himself into it. The lyrics would often mismatch the meaning of the song, or the melody didn't quite suit the instrumental - this was not a problem for her song. If he didn't know better, Seungkwan would've asked whether she had sampled the melody from somewhere online - this was the level of quality of the song.