Sheila's Kwon

6: HELLO, Baby Girl

LOOKING up on the stars that night, Jiyong felt like something in his heart was freed. Sheila had unlocked something in him that he didn't realize he was keeping in. He was afraid of letting go of his pain because it could destroy so many things for him, for his group and for the life that he thought was important to him. Music was everything. Sandara was the source of that music for the longest time. He was watched her fail at love and win against love. He had felt her love and had seemingly forgotten the weight of the responsibility of being another person's better half. He didn't know how to appreciate her. Looking back all that he did was ask for her to love him more and more. He would shower her with affection but she was the only one making the major adjustments, traveling with him, worrying about him. He always assumed that his affection translated and never bothered to explain to her why he was so busy and why he needed her to be with him all the time. She was the one who adjusted to his moods and his needs. Yongbae was always the one who asked her if she needed any help with anything. His bestfriend was mature on his own way, loving Dara in his own way. His vision blurred and he remembered his friend's Wedding Dress video. He was the guy who won the girl but Yongbae was the one who made the bigger and more loving sacrifice. He let the woman that he loves be with the person she preferred to love. And instead of destroying them, he worked hard in keeping them together. It wasn't Yongbae's fault that he dropped the ball.

"I saw that fancam. It's not real. Just like the Instagram account you followed that was a faker posing as Dara." Sheila mentioned a group of fangirls called the YG Mafia who doubled checked fancams and such. She said that they found out that the guy in the picture was someone who had the same hairdo and had been planted in front of Yumi's Cafe as some elaborate scheme to make news in the kpoplandia. The girl was wearing clothes Dara was known to wear and had her hair made up just to look like the singer. "The couple ended up fessing up. They said that they met at Yumi Cafe before and were big fans of the groups so they often copy their look to try to get people interested in asking for their picture. The day that fancam was taken they had a fight because the guy had been caught talking to some girl and chatting her up pretending to be a celebrity. I think they since stopped cosplaying as Dara and Yongbae. The guy shaved his mohawk and the girl cut her hair short. They did do some interesting videos and photoshoots though. I think the guy got a modeling gig out of the whole thing."

He laughed when he realized just how much of a fool he was. He was blaming people for his own short comings. His mom was right, coming to this retreat would help him find the answers. He was just too overwhelmed to even try to listen to reason. He looked at his phone and dreaded opening it. He hasn't since he left. His mother had been calling the retreat to check up on him. He didn't want to face the music so to speak. But there was not a better time than now to get things moving. Moving on and moving forward were two different things. But the first one was needed so that the latter one could be achieved.

Hundreds of voice mails, messages kept coming in right after he read the last. There were e-mails he was asked to read. He fired up his tablet and opened them. There were some from the company and he promptly replied to them. There were none from his family because they knew where he was and he told them when he was coming back. There was an e-mail from Seungri that felt like a kick in the gut.

Hyung,

I heard that you were not coming back until early next month. Why didn't you tell me that you were leaving Korea? I went to your house and your eomma said that you could not be reachable by phone or via any internet related means. She wouldn't tell me where you went exactly but that you are in the Philippines in some retreat house. I needed to ask you for help on some things but Yongbae hyung and Daesung hyung have pitched in to do that instead. You are not going to forget your promise to me that you would support me no matter what, right? And you have not forgotten that I promised you that I would support you in whatever you are going through or may go through, right?