language barrier ☆ junhui (HUGE REWRITE)

XIV

"Soooo how'd it go?!" Mei was instantly bombarded by questions coming from all of the Pledis girls.

"I- I don't know actually, they didn't give me much feedback" Mei answered and all the girls' faces dropped.

"Really? What'd they make you do?" Yebin asked, and Mei sighed.

"Well, not much actually. When I got there, I was put in a room with the most important people from the company and was told to sing and perform anything that I knew from my training" The girls were shocked to say the least, they knew it was normal for a company to do that, but not as quick as they did to Mei.

"Wait so what'd you sing?" Sungyeon asked.

"Well I just sang the ballad version of Into The New World, and they made me dance to any After School song I knew, so I decided to do Bang"

"You went for the girl group classics, huh?" The girls laughed and started guiding Mei back to her dorm, until a voice was heard behind them.

"Miss Mei? The CEO is looking for you" The company's main secretary said, holding a folder in one hand and looking at all the girls. "Follow me, please"

Mei gulped, waving her friends off and following the secretary.

—

"Hey boys!" Jieqiong almost yelled, coming inside the Seventeen training room, most of the boys hanging out in any part of the room, only a couple of them missing.

"Hey ladies! What's with the happy faces?" Seokmin asked and they all looked at each other smiling.

"Mei came back from BigHit just earlier" Siyeon said, sitting down against a wall, laying her back on it and sighing.

Junhui's head instantly perked up, he became all ears. Minghao laughed and slightly slapped his back.

"What'd she say?" Joshua asked.

"We'll let her tell you about it, but she seemed to be okay about the visit"

—

Mei bowed instantly as she walked into the room, greeting her superior.

"Hello!" She said happily. No matter how polite or serious she had to be, her cheery side always came out when dealing with her superiors.

"Hello Mei, good to see you. I called you down here because I got a call from BigHit as soon as you left" He explained, pulling out one of the papers from the folder the secretary had given him when Mei entered.

"Oh?" Mei was confused and concerned. There was no way it was good news if they had called instantly.

"They said you have the right skills for them, but would rather take you in when you've had further training and explored all of your abilities" He said, reading what had been clearly written down on the paper, probably notes from when they got the call.

"D-Did they say when I have to go with them?" She slightly hoped it wasn't any time soon, she'd grown so close to so many of the trainees that she'd feel terrible to leave them now.

"Well they didn't specify exactly, but they did say that for such a short amount of training, you have a lot of talent and potential, so I doubt it will take long for them to take you in"

"I don't mean to sound rude, but why can't they train me themselves?" She asked, slightly tugging on the edge of her shirt out of nervousness.

He sighed, before putting away the paper and looking her directly in the eyes. "They actually did ask to take you in immediately, Mei" She widened her eyes, but why- "But we told them we wanted to help you increase your skills under Pledis' name, call us greedy, but we really don't want to let go of you just yet. It's a privilege to have you train under our name, with our teachers, your talent is clearly star material, but we're not the right company for you to be able to reach that high of a level"

Around 15 minutes later, Mei was leaving the CEO's office, almost breaking down in tears. She knew he was right about this company's potential at the moment, but it still hurt to leave all of this for her benefit.

You see, Mei had always loved to do things for other people's benefits, never her own. Even if she wasn't truly happy, she was glad to be the reason behind someone else's happiness. That was until she decided to stop and become what she had always wanted, an idol. No matter how many hearts she broke to be here, her heart was good and happy, and that's what mattered to her the most.

Sadly, she knew staying in this company would lead to her not being able to debut for a couple more years or longer, and she knew it wouldn't be worth it at the end, seeing how Pledis has had financial problems that only certain strategies could solve and, sadly, she wasn't one of those strategies.

She wiped the tears that were slightly building up in her eyes and sniffled, making herself presentable to meet her friends again.

It's all going to be okay Mei.

•

hey buds its been like half a year since ive updated but im back!! during this hiatus this book has gone up +6k reads which is absolutely crazy!! i cant thank all of you enough for being so patient and still choosing to read this book when it was in hiatus!! expect more updates from my part again,, im extremely sorry for being gone for so long but i hope i will make it up to all of you with my updates!!

all the love,

ana xx