Forever Young 영원히 젊은 Park Jimin

Prologue: BLACKPINK in Your Area

This is it.

In a few minutes, everything that I've worked hard for will finally pay off.

I tried to shake off my nerves as best as I can, silently wishing that my heart would stop thumping so hard against my chest.

"BLACKPINK, please go to your positions. We'll be live in five minutes." A man carrying a clipboard and wearing a headset said as he entered our dressing room. I flinched at the sudden sound. All of us- all five members- have been quiet, each lost in our own thoughts in the moment leading up to our stage debut. The other staff- our make-up artists, stylists, and managers- have already left to give us some time to ourselves.

Kim Jisoo, the oldest member, visual, and resident mom of the group, was the first to stand up from her seat.

"Okay, let's do this!" She exclaimed, pumping her fist in the air.

Kim Jennie, our main rapper and my best friend, laughed at our eonni's gesture and stood up as well.

"Right! We got this girls!" She beamed.

Park Chaeyoung, A.K.A. Rosé, our lead vocal, smiled nervously before she too got up.

"We're gonna show them what we're made of!" She encouraged, speaking in English with her adorable Australian accent.

Lalisa Manoban, A.K.A. Lisa, our main dancer and maknae, practically jumped out of her seat.

"BLACKPINK fighting!" She cheered.

The four of them turned their gazes on me, each with different expressions on their faces, but all of their eyes were saying the same thing.

This is our moment.

Blinking away the tears that were starting to gather in the corners of my eyes, I ignored my shaking knees and got up.

"Let's kill that stage!" I said as I opened my arms for a group hug. We all went in and squeezed each other as hard as we could.

This is it.

"Now let's go before they come looking for us." Jisoo-eonni reminded. We all laughed and broke apart as we headed out of the room and towards the stage.

- - -

"Let's go, let's go!" We sang into the microphone as we got into our final poses. Jisoo-eonni and Jennie were half-kneeling, while me, Rosé, and Lisa were standing at the back. As soon as the final notes of the song faded out, we were deafened by the cheers of the crowd. All five of us were breathing heavily after dancing and singing live to two songs back-to-back. We held our poses for a few more seconds before finally taking a bow and getting off the stage.

When we reached our dressing room, all the feelings finally hit me. I was overwhelmed with a sense of accomplishment, and love for my members and our crew. The entire staff was telling us that we did a good job. I looked over to my right and saw that Lisa and Rosé were already crying while hugging each other and that Jennie was trying hard not to. Jisoo-eonni was patting Rosé's head, trying to get her to calm down. I felt my eyes start to water and immediately pinched the bridge of my nose to stop the tears from falling.

"Don't even bother, we both know you're going to cry!" Jennie teased as she approached me, her voice shaking.

"I'm not gonna cry, you're gonna cry!" I retorted. She sniffed and finally she exploded.

"I'm already crying!" She laughed. With that, I also began crying. We both laughed again at how silly we were being.

A staff member approached us and handed us some tissues. I grabbed some and began patting my tears. When we finally collected ourselves, Jennie turned to me with a mischievous smirk on her face.

"Now let's get Jisoo-eonni to cry." She said. I laughed as she dragged me to our eonni.

- - -

The months leading up to our debut were super hectic, but I loved every second of it. I had only been a trainee in YG Entertainment for a little under a year when I was called into our boss, Yang-sajangnim's office. I was a hundred percent sure that he was going to tell me that they were going to drop me because that was the only reason that trainees as new as I get called to his office.

Imagine my surprise when he told me that I was going to debut as the main vocal of BLACKPINK, which was already announced to be a four-member group only.

The company had me move from my old dorm, where I bunked with seven other girls, to a new one, which I shared with my members. In the first BLACKPINK dorm, before we moved to our current one where we each had our own rooms, there were only two rooms with two beds each, so I offered to sleep on the couch in the living room instead, but all of them objected. Eventually, we settled that I would bunk with the maknaes- Rosé and Lisa- and that we would push the beds together to fit all three of us.

We had spent that first night getting to know each other- well, me getting to know them and vice versa. They were already dorming and taking lessons separately from the other trainees when I entered YG, so I only saw them sometimes in the cafeteria or the hallways.

Even though they were already close to each other, they never made me feel out of place or left out. Sure, we had some rough patches and disagreements, but eventually, we resolved them. Now, I can't imagine my life without these girls. They're more than just my members, they're my sisters.

I'm the luckiest girl in the world.

- - -

Eonni - 언니 - What a younger girl would call an older girl

Sajangnim - 사장님 - Boss

Maknae - 막내 - The youngest in the group