If I Were You (Stray Kids Lee Know X Female OC)

Ch. 18: It's Not Fair

Click!

"Ha! The Memo is sure to love this!" a quiet voice whispers out of sight after having clicked an image. Not a single person is anywhere else, except for the two people this person had just taken a picture of. But that just makes things so much easier for the spy, as they look one last time at the pair talking not too far away, before they run away from the scene, snickering to themselves, and about to start a controversy.

This time, however, it won't be Hyunjin falling into a dating rumor.

▪■▪

A series of knocks falls on Nayeon's room in Melodine's dorm, and upon hearing them, the girl quickly raises her head and looks at the wooden structure. It doesn't take long before she hears the knocks again, followed by Kyungjoo's voice which eventually pulls her put of her bed and towards the door.

"Nayeon? Are you in there?" Kyungjoo calls out from outside.

Nayeon then opens the door, and a second later, she meets the leader's eyes, and her hand holding up her phone. On the screen, her messaging app is open, and Nayeon quickly realizes what it's about.

"You should get ready. Our manager just called me and says we need to be at the company by ten."

"Oh, right!" Nayeon replies energetically, turning to get ready, only to pause a second later before she turns back to Kyungjoo. "About... what exactly?... Are we in trouble?"

"Oh, no. I don't think it is," Kyungjoo reassures her as she smiles. "They probably just want to brief us on a project for us to work on. Maybe a reality show or anything else."

"Oh... cool! I'll get ready now, then!" Nayeon replies enthusiastically, before she closes the door just as Kyungjoo walks away. As soon as the door is closed, however, Nayeon's enthusiasm disappears, and she remains standing behind her door with her hand floating not too far from the handle. In a few seconds, she turns around, but only to end up leaning against the door as she sighs deeply.

Something has been... stirring, one could say, within Melodine. Everyone could feel it, but most especially Nayeon who feels like she might just be the most affected here. Kyungjoo's even started to treat her differently, a bit colder than usual, too, and while Nayeon tries her best not to pay much attention to it... she's not really doing a good job at it.

Soon, Nayeon pulls her phone out of her pocket, before she turns it on to the comment section of a video about Melodine's line distribution of their debut song. Most of them weren't very nice to her, especially when, at the end of the video, her icon stayed at the top, with the numbers 43.7% right next to it.

[Wow... That's crazy. Is this really a group? Lol ]

[Nayeon's lucky~ She's on her way to becoming the company's princess]

[They should have just named this group Nana ft. Others lol]

[Why are the others even here, then?]

[I wonder what Nana pulled to get that much lines... Bet she slept with a bunch of guys just to get that much lol]

[Is she desperate or something?]

"How come... I didn't notice?" Nayeon wonders as fear and guilt mix inside her like a raging typhoon threatening to begin. "How come I didn't notice I had that much... Did I– Did I do something? What... what did I do–"

Knock, knock!

"Nayeon?" Kyungjoo's voice echoes behind the door, and Nayeon snaps out of her thoughts, her phone falling from her hand and dropping to the ground with a rather loud thud. Kyungjoo's voice calls out again. "Nayeon, are you okay in there?... We're ready to go."

"I-I'm almost done!" Nayeon replies, before she quickly picks her phone up and grabs whatever clothes she sees first. In a few minutes, she eventually finishes, and she fixes her hair one last time before she goes and opens the door of her room.

She jerks back, however, when she suddenly finds all the other members of Melodine looking at her when she comes out, and it scares her for a moment... until she finally convinces herself that it should be normal since she's the last person to come out of her room.

Nayeon manages to force a smile on jer face as she speaks out to them. "Let's go?"

▪■▪

Later that night, Hyunjin had just finished his practice for the day at about 11:00 p.m., when barely anyone is at the company anymore, except for a few idols working overtime and the janitors. Things have been going smoothly for him so far, maybe even a bit too suspiciously well. But that's one thing he feels thankful for. Now if only it would stay that way until his promotions are over.

Now, being busy with his own issues was one thing Hyunjin had. Another is concerning himself with the issues and problems of his close friends. But when it comes to other people in the company whom he can barely even call his colleagues... Well, what exactly is he supposed to do when he finds them having problems? And seemingly facing them by themselves as well?

Hyunjin walks down the hall, unaware of what he's about to face, when he passes by Melodine's practice room only to suddenly hear the sound of someone crying.

All of a sudden, he freezes. And a chill runs down his spine as he slowly turns towards the door of the practice room. Strange, the lights inside seem to be all turned off, but he's sure the crying sound must be coming inside.

"W-what..." He can barely even talk out of fear, as he wonders if he's hearing things right, or that maybe it's just a hallucination because he's just tired from work. Shaking, he nears the door of the practice room, pushing himself to investigate even further even though all he can think of is to run away from whatever entity is inside the practice room.

He's right. He gets his confirmation of the source of the crying sound when he pushes his ear to the door and he hears crying just on the other side of the door. His eyes widen, and then a yell comes out of him as he quickly moves back, almost stumbling over his own feet.

All of a sudden, the crying stops, and Hyunjin's eyes widen yet again when he realizes that. He's been detected, and that's not really a good sign for him, because whatever it is haunting that room... If it knows of his existence, will it haunt him, too?

His fear only worsens when the door suddenly clicks, indicating that it's about to be opened. Hyunjin freezes yet again, before his eyes widen and his fear gets worse, and he tries to make himself move even just a little bit to get away from the situation.

Slowly, the door opens, and Hyunjin can feel his breath hitching as his feet can only move in the smallest steps out of his frozen fear. The darkness inside the room is becoming even more apparent, and whatever is hiding in it is about to come out and face him.

"GAHH!" All of a sudden, Hyunjin actually stumbles over his own feet, and he yells as he falls and lands on the floor just as the door finally opens only to reveal Nayeon, shock sketched on her tear-stained face as she looks at Hyunjin.

"Y-y-you?!" Hyunjin asks out loud when he finally recognizes the female idol, yet his fear still remains evident on his face.

"S-sunbae...?" Meanwhile, Nayeon seems even more shocked as she looks on at her senior, before her eyes widen when she suddenly realizes who had found her. "D-Doyoung-sunbae's friend?!"