A voice to love

Chapter 2 - Hyun-mi

Later that day me and Kate went to this lovely Chinese restaurant that had the best dumplings I have ever tasted in my life. It seemingly was their specialty and I could figure why.

The whole atmosphere in the restaurant was so serene but still had an fancy exterior. Me and Kate come here a lot, just to talk or relax a little. "Why are these so good..." Kate said stuffing another dumpling into her mouth.
"Ask the chef, I would say" I said and laughed.
"I'm seriously doubting to do that, I mean I could try getting a part-time job here?"
"Well we are kinda short handed these days" the lady behind the desk of the restaurant said.
"So if you are willing to, I'll teach you how to make them after you work your shift" the lady said.
"Deal!" called Kate and smiled. She had been looking for a nice part-time job for ages, so this was the golden opportunity for her.
"Well, that went quickly" I laughed.
"Duh, I wanted a job like this for ages" she said smiling.

We finished our meals and Kate went to ask the lady when she would start her job. We left the restaurant and waved to the lady who happily waved back. Kate found out the lady and her husband had run the place for years, but it suddenly became really busy and they were short handed. So Kate was exactly what they needed.

"Hey, should we just go shopping a little?" Kate suggested.
"That's a great idea!" I said smiling. She smiled off and we went shopping.
We went into this cute little accessorizes store and tried out different accessorize. We had a lot of fun and went through a few other stores.

We talked and laughed when we walked down the street, until my eye caught a poster on a wall. I stood still and looked at it.

"Seriously Hyun-mi, if you are not signing yourself up for that, I will" I heard Kate say.
On the poster was written that one of my favorite Korean entertainment company was holding auditions here in San Francisco.
I've always wanted to be a singer and I've always loved Korean pop-music. Partly because I was fluent at Korean -I'm so happy my grandparents taught me- and loved the genre so much. Though there were all kinds of groups, I've always preferred to go solo or duo. I hadn't had a specific reason for it, but maybe it was that I wanted to leave a more meaningful message in my singing and that was something not so easily done by being in a group.

"Should I do it?" I asked looking over at Kate. She started to nod heavily and I felt myself starting to smile. Kate quickly took a picture of the poster. "There is no turning back now, we are going to fill in that form when we reach my house, am I clear?" Kate said, her face looking rather serious.
"Yes ma'am, very clear" I said and bursted out in laughter because of her facial expression.
"What?!" She demanded, but finally started to lose it too and laughed along with me.

We talked about school while we made our way to her house.
"We should finish that assignment though" Kate said.
"Yeah we should." I looked up and saw that grey clouds started hovering the sky.
"Did the weather forecast say that we would be having a storm?" I asked.
"Not that I've heard" Kate said.
"Unexpected storm, hurray" I said "let's hurry up now."
"Yep!" and we started jogging.

We made it just in time as we heard the sounds off thunder behind us.
"So, some tea?" Kate said smiling.
I nodded and she left to the kitchen. I walked to the living room and sat down on the comfy couch.

"There you go" Kate said as she placed the hot cup on the coffee table.
She took place on the sofa in front of me.
"Thank you" I said with a smile.
"So lets make that homework and do that audition clip" Kate took a sip from her tea and looked at me.
"Yeah, yeah" I said and placed the cup between my hand and had it warm them.

I took out the assignment and laid it down on the table.
"Should we start with science or geography?" I said and looked at Kate.
"Geography" Kate said with a smile.
Oh dear, she seriously loves that subject. We started working and were done at around six. That was the time when Kate's parents walked in.

"Evening ladies" mister Willbury spoke.
"Hello, Alfred" I said with a smile. "Are you staying here for dinner?" He asked me.
"Can I?" I asked
"Of course you can sweetheart."
"Thank you" I said smiling.

After that I called my grandparents saying that they didn't have to wait for me to eat dinner and that I would be staying at Kate's house for the evening. They wished me fun and expected me home at around ten.

I saw a head popping up from the kitchen.
"Dinner is ready girls" miss Willbury softly spoke. We both ran to the kitchen and took seats next to each other. Miss Willbury put down a delicious roasted chicken on the table and it smelled so good that I started water mouthing. Miss Willbury is an amazing cook.
"How has school been?" mister Willbury started while he started putting the food on our plates.
"Ah, sweetheart I forgot the cutlery, can you get them for me?" miss Willbury looked at Kate and Kate gave her mother a nod.
"School was fine" Kate said as she stood up and went to get the cutlery. Once she returned we talked and ate for an hour.

I can say that I was complete stuffed afterwards. Me and Kate headed up to her room and I plumped down on her bed.
"So, let's get started with this audition" Kate said excited. I nodded and smiled.
"We should look the rules up online" I looked at Kate and she stood up to turn up her computer.
"You start searching, I'll get the camera, kay?" she said.
"Yes ma'am" I said smiling. I logged in and looked up the rules. Kate was back in a few seconds.
Kate placed the camera onto her desk "okay, now tell me what are the entry rules are."
"Okay here we go:
1. Face must be visible
2. Instrument or instrumental can't overlap the voice too much
3. Two versions of the song, one with music and one without
4. It's good to send in a dance/rap audition, but not necessarily needed
5. Blablabla."
I looked at Kate. "Well, go on?" she said.
"Ugh, can't you read the rest yourself?" I said pouting. "Okay fine, I will" she said and together we read the last few rules.
"Let's do this!" I said actually excited. "That's the spirit Hyun-mi" Kate said smiling.

"Which song are you gonna sing?" I looked at Kate while she asked that. I wanted to just had one specific song in mind. "I'm gonna sing 10cm's 'Tonight I'm afraid of the dark', even if it's indie, it's such a gorgeous song and it has such a soothing beat to it, but because you are able to upload two different songs I'll do two different ones. Thus for the second song I'll sing Taeyeon's 'Can you hear me' ".

"First, we need some little make-up on your face and some slight waves" Kate spoke.
"Ugh fine" and pouted at Kate. She left her room again to probably get her whole kit. I stood up, grabbed Kate's guitar and tuned it. It has a beautiful mahogany color and a very soft tune.
Kate used to play guitar, but she quitted a few years ago. I remembered her being her really good at it. I've been learning it since last year, but I made progress really quick.

I started playing a little part of the song that I chose. "That's sounding just fine" Kate said as she walked in. I placed the guitar right beside me.
"Make-up time" she said grinning. Kate gave me a elegant but natural look, which I honestly quite liked. The soft pink tones matched the slight waves she had put into my hair.
"It looks awesome, thanks Kate" I said smiling.
"No problem, girlie" she said.

Kate suddenly spoke "but now let's start recording, otherwise we might not be able to finish it today."
"Okay, okay, let's start" I said as I grabbed her guitar again. Kate walked to her camera and said "whenever you're ready!"
"Ready!" I said and I started playing my first chosen song. The room filled itself with a soothing sound and I started singing. I closed my eyes and felt my voice melting with the sounds of the guitar.

Strange thing was, I did not felt the extreme urge to continue singing like I had felt in class, I could feel it was there, but it wasn't as overwhelming as it had been. I opened up my eyes again and saw Kate just staring at me with her mouth hanging open as I sang the last part and finally hit the last chord on the guitar.

I saw Kate stopping the recording an she looked back at me her eyes filled with an emotion I could not explain until Kate spoke. "That sounded just magical."