* / 𝕥𝕠 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕤𝕜𝕪 !

with the busy month coming up, yoojin feels like she should be basking in the short period of relaxation before they’re back on to busy schedules. instead, yoojin’s been in her head about just about everything, and already feels exhausted about the schedules. thinking too far ahead, knowing that there wasn’t going to be time to do much else but practice, record, and practice some more. yoojin wasn’t sure how some groups did this – yoojin wouldn’t say it was common for 7ROPHY’s schedule to be so jam-packed. it’s also been quite some time since yoojin felt so completely overwhelmed, and back then it hadn’t been because of their schedules. 

when eunah knocks on her door, yoojin doesn’t expect the other to be asking her to come out with her, and even less does she expect to agree. but then, here she is, sitting at a late night café with her dear friend and groupmate. 

“ it is … quiet … ” yoojin states with a smile. it’s what they need, quite honestly – somehow, being there helps yoojin’s mind calm a bit. the atmosphere is inviting and cozy, which yoojin can’t say for many other places. “ how’d you find it, anyway ? i swear, i’ve been waiting to get out of here since we landed in the us. ” yoojin chuckles – although, she’s not exactly lying. after all, yoojin hates making these trips, she’s never been the adventurous type. she hates flying, gets terrible jet lag not to mention motion sickness if she can’t fall asleep. she hates it. she hates travelling. but, her members make it bearable. “ how’re you doing, by the way ? i feel like we don’t get the chance to ask and answer that honestly, most of the time … ” yoojin states quietly, a sad smile on her lips. “ you have a comeback soon – how’re preparations going ? ”

“ or … do you not wanna talk about work ? ” yoojin suggests, brows raised. “ we don’t have to talk about work … isn’t it what we always do ? ” she chuckles lightly, stirring her drink lightly.

“ah, i have a nose for places like this,” eunah says, smiling at her reflection in her tea. she laughs, and shakes her head. “no, i asked a friend if they knew anywhere quiet. they’re back home --” she means seattle, of course, “-- for a couple of weeks. it’s kind of bad timing that we came here right now...” her gaze wanders, fixing itself on the blurry lights and figures moving outside the window, as she continues talking. “he’s a couple years older than me, he was always, you know, the guy who got the lead. everyone knew he’d end up out here.” waiting tables, mostly, dragging his jazz shoes from audition to audition. still, part of her thinks she’d still trade. “he’s actually got a nose for places like this.” she’d felt guilty, messaging him out of the blue, when usually they only call or text to congratulate each other on a break.

she’d felt guilty then too, when he said he saw how a-teen was blowing up. 

“well, my hair’s not falling out too badly,” eunah says, gingerly touching her bubblegum pink scalp. she’d had pink hair once before, back during latata promotions, and she’d gotten a lot of attention for it. the company was keen on bringing it back -- you have scripts to read in the meantime, don’t you? and they’ll all want your hair boring and black or brown, said the hairstylist folding foil into her hair. eunah wanted to remind her that her hair had been auburn at the start of the year, which she thought was quite interesting, actually, but she kept her mouth shut and hummed in response instead. back in the present, eunah laughs. the sound is lacking in any kind of support. “sixteen days until release. i’m proud of it, but...” eunah takes a long sip from her drink, and neglects to finish her sentence, choosing to latch onto the way out yoojin provided instead. 

rather than giving into the feeling that she should let herself pass out, and allow yoojin to do the same, it’s their mutual experience of persisting exhaustion that actually prompts eunah to knock on yoojin’s hotel room door that night. it might seem counterproductive, but eunah’s reached a stage where sleep feels almost like a chore in itself -- it’s something that she does as part of her regular routine of running around from schedule to schedule, not something she’s able to even enjoy anymore. she isn’t sure if yoojin’s gotten there quite yet, but she’s still convinced that it would do her member good to spend more time out in the city that never sleeps, doing something out of the norm, doing something different.

though, she supposes there isn’t actually much different about visiting a café late at night, sitting on brown leather sofas as jazz plays on a record player from the corner. it is a change of scenery, however, and that’s good enough for eunah to finally feel like she can let out the breath she’s been holding. it’s better than a hotel room, anyways, the most constricting of liminal spaces, in eunah’s opinion. bag half unpacked, barely cracked open complementary toiletries, a foreign bed, no time to settle in before rolling her suitcase down the corridior all over again -- no, thanks. she sips at her green tea with that relief in mind. for the time being, they can pretend to be normal. 

eunah’s eyes slowly blinked open, the back of the seat in front of her, complete with its folded up little tray table, emerging in her vision. blurry, the rest of her surroundings gradually materialize around her, as her dry, itchy eyes finally adjust. she’s small, so she’s lucky -- the limited space on the plane doesn’t bother her much. she rolls her neck around, and silently examines yuzu, her partner for their almost fourteen hour flight. “are you comfortable?” she suddenly breaks the silence, soft voice cutting through the gentle whir of the air conditioning. 

steps away she was, when kiana’s mouth finally caught up with her brain… if you could call it that. “h- eu- wait!”

kiana had never been the type for exercise. if it wasn’t for her mother and her company, she might have enjoyed a life where she only walked to where she needed to go, and spent the rest of that time sitting on her butt. as ann perkins once said, ‘jogging is the worst. i know it keeps you healthy, but, god, at what cost?’ yet, here she was, a hypocrite, with fear propelling her forward. ki kept an arm against her to prevent her clothes from billowing too much as she jogged the short distance up to and around eunah to face her once again.

although, meeting eunah’s face had kiana at yet another mind blanking instant. when she did manage words, they came out in a breath, “how are you?” the most simple, baseline thing she could possibly ask, and probably the worst question she could have come up with. she attempted at a smile but it fell apart. “that’s probably not the right question, i mean, what’s new? what’s… is there anything i could do for you?” which question she ultimately wanted answered, even kiana wasn’t sure. in any other circumstance, she wouldn’t have wanted to have this conversation at all, but- she’d been asked, and connections, no matter how far away they physically were from her, were paramount.

wait, said kiana. eunah didn’t, opting to keep on walking, hands clasped by the pinky fingers behind her back. apparently that wasn’t enough for kiana to get the message, who faced her again with a breathless smile. eunah dropped her hands, letting them hang, unimpressed and unenergised, at her sides. she raised an eyebrow at her, listening to her babble out three questions in a row. eunbi. the whole thing had bibi written all over it. why else would kiana approach her like this? like she was shadowing eunah’s sisters all over again, as they stuck their heads around eunah’s childhood bedroom door. 

back then, her sister only ever wanted her to shut up and stop belting showtunes. how the times changed -- this had happened before, but she’d only gone as far as blowing up her phone in the past. now, she was employing liaisons to try and get her to speak. the corners of eunah’s lips twitched downwards, flashing a momentary frown before her face returned to neutral.

“i am,” milk acknowledges, noting how thin, how tired their best friend looks. eunah was always a tiny thing issues notwithstanding, but milk’s worried. dimensions is obsessed with keeping her busy, it seems, and the toll is showing even in the smile she tries to offer.

dumdi dumdi is no great feat, though with the way eunah is working, they’re glad the line distribution doesn’t entirely fall on her this time around. any preparations are exhausting, and the girl is working doubly hard. 

leaning down to gingerly stroke crys, milk considers the question, though not half as much as she considers the smile and the worry it brings forth in them. they wished dearly for it to be genuine, but no part of them believed it. 

“about as well as expected, i guess. i’m no seola, but i think i’m getting the dance.” they said, glancing down at crys then back up to study eunah again. “how was today?” one day at a time - they didn’t expect full disclosure, but they wanted to give her room to speak. they knew eunah would see the question for what it really was - how can i help you?

“you’re home.”

it’s a funny kind of greeting, uncharacteristic of the kind usually exchanged between the two of them. but eunah’s barely in the door herself, her thin cardigan still wrapped tightly around her beneath her folded arms. the cat rubbing against her legs quickly abandons her to do the same to lux. she watches crys cross the room with a smile, and then turns away, preferring to stare at her reflection in their blacked out tv screen than at her best friend and roommate of over six years. they’d seen each other earlier that day -- dumdi dumdi dance rehearsals were inescapable, even for eunah, who’s already missing half of them for her solo promotions. 

she’ll make up for it though, through no voluntary effort of her own, of course. the manager assigned to eunah these days is the strict kind, the overbearing sort that eunah hates so much.

with a fresh smile, painstakingly painted onto her features, eunah whips back around to face lux. she knows they won’t believe her, but she does her best to put her best foot forward. for an actor, she’s one terrible liar. 

“i mean, its what i signed up for, you know? don’t got a choice, so gotta make it fun someway.“ jakyung explained with a shrug, sliding down the sofa ever so slightly. being on tour for so long, only seeing his members and the gold star staff was definitely getting to him. however, that didn’t stop him from going out in the middle of the night to eat or have a walk. “well, if you are going to promote for a while, i doubt they will be flying you in and out. plus, i’m only going to osaka from seoul, could be worse.“ he explains, but he still understands eunah. he glances over at her when she doesn’t finish her sentence, but he doesn’t push. he knew better than to do that. “now that i’m here, i need to buy it. you promise to sign it for me next time we meet?“ it was a little something jakyung did. buying the albums of people he was close to. 

“two blocks away..“ the rapper repeats, scrolling through his phone with a hum. “i found it. you can pick whatever you want.” he says, handing his phone to eunah to chose. it was going to be faster that way.

“hm.” for a moment, eunah says nothing for a moment, gaze veering away from jakyung’s eyes. “is it really? this is what you signed up for?” this, of course, is the flights back and forth. the constantly growing amount of advertisements she sees jakyung and his members’ faces plastered on all over seoul. gold star’s increasingly obvious trend towards locking their moneymakers up in their basement until they need a big injection of cash and investors. eunah sits back and looks up, out at the city beyond her window rather than at jakyung. “i didn’t.” she didn’t know what she was signing up for at all, back then. she turns her attention back to her visitor, the corners of her lips quirking up momentarily. “though i can sign albums. there’s no harm in that. -- but you don’t have to buy it. i haven’t given out the copies i got from dimensions. they’re still sitting in my backpack.” 

she snaps up jakyung’s phone, and quickly inputs her usual order. squid sashimi, tamagoyaki ... and usually, that’s where she would stop. her thumb hovers over multiple other options for several seconds, but ultimately, she scrolls past each of them, and hands jakyung back his phone. she’s too tired to decide if anything else sounds appealing to her in the moment, and her favourites will comfort her. hopefully. that’s the idea, anyways. 

date: january 2021, around/after writing so-so. word count: 1,634, not including lyrics. this starts off decently but as it nears the time of me writing this note (03:31 am), it gets considerably worse. anyways please point and laugh at dumbass sarah from months ago for thinking she’d get all of eunah’s verifications done in time, bc she did not know abt the big storm comin’ that she had irl. 3/5 isn’t bad though considering. as usual, big ups to beth for reading through my eunah brain nonsense. and tyvm to ark for letting me rob @fmdyoojin for the feature last minute!! eunah thinks of things as gas cloud vibes and i think that’s very cool of her, except when i have to turn those gas cloud vibes into words. why is this note so long. i am sleepy so i’m rambling. i walked 10km today so now i will go pass out.

CW: very brief references to disorderd eating habits + eating disorders, primarily in the first paragraph and the final sentence..

tired. that’s all she is these days, dragging her feet from one schedule to the next, and barely even speaking to her members, somehow even more quiet at home with lux and crys the cat than she had been before too. there’s a black cloud above her head, and she knows it -- the rain’s been brewing inside of it for a long time now, and eunah can’t be bothered to dispel it. instead, rather than bring the mood down in 7rophy’s waiting area backstage, eunah wanders off by herself, bottle of water in hand. 

foggy eyed, foggy brained, eunah eventually bumps into someone back stage, and unfortunately, it’s someone that she knows, someone that she has known for a long time. her lips curl into a strained smile as she meets kiana’s eyes. ki has always been nice to her. back home in seattle, when eunah was just a kid, and again in the idol industry -- though she suspects that has more to do with her meddling older sisters than it does to do with kiana. she wonders if the fuse member is influenced by them at all, if she sees eunah as the kid she was all those years ago too. she knows her sisters see her that way. they deny it, but they must. she just knows. maybe kiana is smarter though, and knows better. no matter what bullshit she’s being fed, maybe she knows she should leave eunah alone to deal with her problems herself. 

“thank you for having me over.“ is all what jakyung could really say. he was usually definitely more considerate of people, however, with the few free days he had on his hands without any schedules he was really trying to make the most out of it. especially seeing people he hadn’t seen in over a few months.

“like i said, its one of the few days i don’t have a manager within 5 feet of me. we literally fly in and out of osaka for the next month, not really fun if you ask me.“ there is a small pause in his answers, taking of his shoes and neatly placing them next to the entrance. “i saw, i also listened to it. it’s a good album.“ jakyung says, nodding his head ever so softly as he follows eunah further into her place. he gives the cat a smile, quickly moving past it in case it had forgotten him, and he didn’t really want any bad blood with the animal, before sitting not so far from eunah, “sushi it is. any specific place?“ the rapper asks, already pulling out his phone to see where they could actually order from.

“no. i don’t think i’d call it fun either,” eunah answers, tone melancholy as she considers what that would even look like for 7rophy. there’s been no word on whether or not they’ll be going back to japan anytime soon. instead, dimensions have set their sights farther afield. “it looks like dimensions is setting us up to promote in the states. i don’t really feel like flying back and forth from there all the time either though so ...” as much as the opportunity to see her family more sounds lovely, as much as that is something she’s dreamed of for years, eunah knows it also comes with the added annoyance of them potentially being on her ass more about her health. “i dunno. yeah. it feels kind of weird when ...” when they’re doing so well domestically for the first time in their careers. she feels like their position is still much too precarious to justify branching out so far. “well, i’m glad you like the album. i worked hard.”

too hard. not hard enough. all things, all at once. 

the thought that he maybe had to call or message in advance came to him, but it was late. it wasn’t the first time he had done such a thing. his schedule was packed to the maximum, especially with their recent tour. flying in and out of osaka, while preparing for their newest song.. it wasn’t anything jakyung couldn’t handle, but he really just needed to see someone else. someone who wasn’t their regular staff or origin.

“oh- yeah, sure, take your time.“ he says, nodding his head a bit and looking at the door next to him. it opens quicker than he though it would and the origin leader felt like a deer in headlights. “hey.“ he says, smile pulling on his lips as he slips his phone into the pocket of his sweats. “yeah, of course. whatever you say. i probably should have called in advance but-“ jack pauses, a frown threthening to form on his features “its literally one of my few free days this month while im back in seoul.“ he says, smile pulling on his lips soon after. “anyway! we got a lot of catching up to do and you can pick what food you’d like. all on me.“

she wants to tell him that she agrees, that yeah, he probably should have called before he came over, so that she could’ve told him not to bother. instead, eunah smiles and shakes her head at him, stepping aside so he could come through into her apartment. “nonsense. it’s nice to have a surprise visitor.”