Taking Flight

Aftermath

"So, what are you going to do?"

Rosa asked her. It was the next day, and the K-pop world had been hit by a storm, because of Daia. They had both been silently reading for a while now, trying to soak it all in. The two of them were sitting on the couch in their dorm, looking at all the news articles that were popping up about her sitting with BTS last night. The web was littered with articles asking if the Daia and RM were dating, to Daia was leaving Albatross to join BigHit as a solo artist.

She thought the latter was a bit extreme, but the article did seem to have a legit argument for it. They cited that Daia had been known to preform sick, as was seen that night, and that BigHit was seeking to sign on new artists. But she didn't really see how sitting with the boy band could be confirmation that she was going solo. Since it had been noticed she had performed sick, their fans seemed to push that she just wanted to get away from the group for a bit, till she felt better. Daia liked those responses better, as they were closer to the truth. She had wanted to escape, but not from her group, but from her manager. In her mind, he wouldn't try anything if she was with a group of men.

Social Media was also blowing up about Daia and BTS, or more specifically Namjoon. Daia didn't even bother to respond to all the texts and responses that were being made. Why did she have to explain herself for a simple misunderstanding. But, within minutes #DaiaJoon was trending, and overall, netizens seemed to support the two as a couple. Even though there was really nothing going on between. She hadn't really considered the consequences of sitting with BTS last night, nor could she have imagined the chaos that would ensue from it. At the moment, it seemed fine to go and sit somewhere else, but now she was begin to see the great impact her simple action had made.

And to make matters worse, she still had Namjoon's jacket. She had meant to pass it back to him at the end of the show but she had been distracted by Namjoon. When they were in the tunnel leading from the main hall to the backstage, he had whispered in her ear, "Let's meet again", and had slipped a napkin into her free hand. In the dark, she hadn't been able to see what the napkin had said, but in the light of the dressing room, she had seen that it was a phone number. But, responding back to him would make all the reports true, and she wasn't sure she could handle a dating scandal on top of work, she was just barely staying afloat as it was.

"What can I do? I can't say that we are dating, as we just met that night. Everything they think is a lie!" Daia said, frustration in her voice.

"Well, what is the truth?"

Daia pondered for a minute, trying to piece everything together in a coherent way.

"The truth would be... V invited me to sit with them, and I just happened to be next to Namjoon, and it was only polite to talk to him."

"Ahhhuh" Rosa hummed sarcastically. "You sure looked like you were being polite" and she pointed at the short clip of her and Namjoon talking.

Daia could see why Rosa was doubting her. In the video, she was leaning forward as he whispered in her ear. It also appeared that they were holding hands, but in reality the jacket had started to slip and they both had reached to pull it back up, resulting in their hands touching. It really looked like they were a couple by how close they were to each other. How could Daia explain that it was just because the music was loud, so they had to be close to hear each other. Rosa would probably just "Ahhhuh" her again.

"Honest, that's what happened." she pleaded. She hoped that Rosa would be able to fix it, she was always able to fix things. The girls had been given the morning off, to give time to sort out how to handle this new situation.

"On the bright side, we are super popular right now!" Emmy chipped in, leaning down on the back of the couch to look at Rosa's laptop screen. "Everyone's talking about Albatross."