got7 ; 2jae | rewind ↺

chapter 03 | like ooh aah

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park jinyoung smiled once seeing the young boy in front of him who bowed politely. 'choi youngjae #33_a' was tagged on his shirt as he straightened and worry flashed in the brim of his eyes.

"i'm very pleased to see you here youngjae-ah," his voice was stern but welcoming as he made his way to the opposite side of the room and took a seat by the table. "now, we viewed your submitted video application two weeks ago, and i'm not going to hide the fact that most vocal trainers and myself included were quite surprised to hear such vocal potencial."

youngjae blushed, murming a polite thank you in return.

"we would like you to sing a short part from a song of your choice right now, yugyeom-ah will record it for future records and then we should discuss some more things."

with a light nod, youngjae handed in the instrumental version of the song and cleared his throat as jyp inserted the disk into a player that sat beside him. seing that everything was working, youngjae looked at yugyeom who gave him two thumbs up: signalling that the camera was on.

youngjae began with a bow, "the song i chose to sing is lately by jodeci," he took a moment of silence as the stereo scratched and began to play. a series of heavy but high piano notes rang in arpeggios, and youngjae closed his eyes for a split-moment before starting to sing at the exact first beat of the chorus.

unlike his mind, youngjae's voice came out predominantly strong and confident. the lyrics of the song stretching as he hit each note correctly; his throat straining as he held onto these long breathless notes with a firm grasp.

for him, it felt timeless. all these weeks of stressful practices with his brother who helped him out as much as he possibly could. these past days when even his sister would give him a couple of self-esteem boosters. and in the end, he couldn't miss out on his mom's kind words of reassurance and endless tea-making to soar his aching voice at the end of each hard day.

but before he even knew it, the cd stopped its playing; and youngjae's live audition was over.

when he looked up, yugyeom clicked stop on the camera and gave him a small nod. beside him, the panel of people revealed to be looking down, except for jyp. he had his arms crossed against the wooden surface of the desk as he leaned deeper onto his elbows.

and looking straight into his eyes; youngjae couldn't read him. the older's stone face expression was difficult to phrase or understand. and for a heart-pounding moment - youngjae thought it was indeed over.

but jyp turned to his colleagues with a sudden smile, "he's pulling for main vocals, won't that be right?"

the two women nodded eagerly, finally looking up from their notes as they faced the nerve-wrecked boy. "lots of potencial," one murmured. while the other one suggested, "he'd be excellent with another main vocal in pair," she turned to jyp, her eyes bright with ideas, "you know who i'm talking about."

jyp let a grin escape his lips, he knew exactly who the woman was hinting at, "i can see where you're going with this, and i actually agree. their voice combination would sound very flowing together," he agreed.

too afraid to celebrate, youngjae stood wobbling from foot to foot as his fingers tangled in the hem of his shirt.

"choi youngjae-ah?" jyp called him out of his trance, "do you have any dance experience?"

"i— uh, not exactly but—" he stuttered, running a hand through his hair.

"well then you better get started because your group is very strong on choreographies."

"my—," youngjae paused, "what?"

"welcome to jyp entertainment," he smiled.

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stay tuned / mehisdabest ily

written: august 1, 2017
published: august 16, 2017

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