Heart Station

she hadn’t said anything to do haru when they came back to the studio, aside from showing her the lyrics so the other could get an idea for the rap lyrics, jenna hadn’t interacted with her. instead she focused on her laptop with her earphones in, constantly working on the beat. it was only when she was happy with what she had worked on that she turned to haru. her mood had cooled a little but not enough to remove the irration from her face. “do you have anything yet?” she wasn’t expecting much but the other had to have something.

“they’ll be three breaks for the rap part. after my small intro, it’ll go right to the first rap section. so the intro plus the rap will set the mood for the song. the next one will come after the first verse and chorus.” she paused for a second and and took a quick look at her laptop. “the next section will be shorter..so i’m thinking that will be a short speaking part…how is your english? can you write that section in english..the song will end right after that..the intro will basically become the ending part of the song.”

her baby blue propelling pencil kept squeaking on paper as she kept writing down her ideas and notes given by the staff and jenna. it seemed like the other girl had finally accepted haru’s participation in the project. recording sessions always toss her under pressure. to create, master, practice and hope that results will be liked by ones deciding to give them a try. this time she didn’t have that much of a time and someone’s very high expectations to meet. it wasn’t easy, of course. It would never be but there really was no point to dwell on that even further. all dos and don’ts had no longer meaning when it came to something that’d already been decided. like today’s recordings. “english?” her brows furrowed after she had caught glimpse of jenna’s monologue. at first she thought that her peer was just muttering something to herself in some sort of creativity frenzy. haru witnessed something like that in the past, so she decided to keep her mind open for every possibility. the moment of silence that pursued the question let her believe that indeed she was the target of female’s mutterings. “i can try to. could you check the verses later?”

benjy has always been a dog person but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t share a fondness for cats, either — the only problem was the hatred all cats seemed to harbor towards him. he had noticed it since he was a kid when a cat scratched him on his arms while he was trying to pet it, and then again when he wanted to help a cat down from a tree and it actually hissed at him as if it hadn’t been meowing for help all night long. least to say, all his cat endeavors never ended well, even when he reached adulthood.

haru’s cats were no exception to his bad luck. they were far tamer, however, compared to the rest. no scratches, no hissing. benjy decided to take this as an opportunity, determined to make the two ragdoll cats actually like him, in hopes he could sleep a little better at night knowing he hadn’t been cursed by a cat witch or something.

sad to say, he has yet to make any progress. as benjy threw a purple mouse toy at reo, the cat didn’t even bother to acknowledge it, or his presence for that matter, as if he hadn’t been sitting across her for the past twenty minutes. he let out a loud sigh, “either that or there’s something really wrong with me. that can’t be, right? i have a great personality!”

a mischievous smile faintly danced on her lips, as a reaction to a scene that was happening in front of her. oh, the sheer misery that reeked from the male’s body, a tad overdramatic but that was what made it so enjoyable. maybe it was the beer they consumed earlier that afternoon. with nothing scheduled for the day later, the pair could finally chill, with netflix and cats. even though they barely appreciated the plot of some teen drama that run for way too many seasons than necessary.

“yes, you are a man of many charms.” she started with a small nod. “sadly, that’s not enough for you to befriend them.” it was hardly a shame, not for haruka at least. most of the people showing up to her house had her cats exposing their tummies to rub in less than 30 seconds. heck, girl was sure that if a thief had come robbing her, they’d keep them occupied until the police came.

“you know, my mom used to say that people who don’t get along with animals shouldn’t be trusted.” the female told him, while playing with ramu’s fluffy tail. it was a habit, something she’d do to soothe her nerves or make her presence known to the feline. “maybe i should listen to her and rethink my relationships. starting from you.”her fingers formed in a hand pistol pointed at benjy’s chest.“bang!”

haru’s words went through one ear and the other for the most part. jenna heard it but her anger discarded anything that she didn’t deem useful. her frustrations had quickly turned to anger and as she kept thinking, it only got worse. jenna could barely hold back a scoff as she ran a hand through her hair. she barely held back whatever insult was about to come out of her mouth. it was safe to she doubted haru’s ability’s to create lyrics that fit her style. it was petty but she couldn’t help herself.

“it has to be sooner than that..as in no later than an hour or so. i was in the middle of recording the first guide version. i need to get that completed and send it in for review..and i planned to rap and find a rapper later…” a huffed left her mouth and she forced herself to stop her train of thought. “do you have time to listen to it and work on lyrics.” the cherry on top would be that she couldn’t finish her work as she wanted.

“oh okay, let’s go back then, there’s no point in being here any longer, is it? the sooner we start the sooner you can focus on the other tracks.”the words fell flat from her mouth, quite unconvinced about how this all would work but she’d known better than to keep the argument on. it didn’t stop haru’s thought process. oh, how many dark places it’d been traveling to. the sooner they start the sooner maknae could leave the toxic air behind. jynx, you are so talented. you can sing, rap, write lyrics from a scratch. why won’t you just fill every spot in your collab and make sure no one would screw up? a true mystery.

what was the management even expecting? it’s like they’d sent a personal invitation to a party and didn't tell the guest they’d be coming 6 hours later than the rest of the invited people. the feeling hadn’t gone away through the rest of the session. haruka was just sort of sitting there, taking notes while the other girl was doing her thing. they hadn’t talked a great deal since they got back into the studio. it seemed like there was some kinda a silent agreement between them to just focus on the task and the idol was thankful for that.

she hadn’t expected anyone to follow her, it was easy to see that she was pissed and she wanted to be alone. at least those were her thoughts but haru didn’t seem to think the same. the moment she heard the words, jenna spun around. “shouldn’t you work hard on my album for the sake of being a good rapper?” her company thought she needed haru to sell and apparently the girl thought the same. “my album would do well with whoever i had feature on the track.” her anger was a breath away from spilling over.

so she took a deep breath.

“you didn’t need to add the tidbit on. as a singer, i would expect you work hard on any track.” her album had been something she wanted explicit control over but they wanted to do the exact opposite. “let’s just get it finished now since they decided to drop the bomb in the middle of me working on it.” another sigh left her mouth. “i can write the lyrics for your part in a reasonable amount of time i guess.”

for a moment she hated herself for that mishap. the female knew that she really shouldn’t have let those thoughts slip out of the roof of her mouth. not right here, heck, she doubted that in through the space and time there was a moment where they would have been suitable. usually, she’d just smile sheepishly and apologize but jenna’s words seemed to cut through maknae’s defenses straight to the most vulnerable parts of her sub consciousness. haru wasn’t a good rapper, and she knew that when left alone with aria’s main vocalist, she’d stuck out like a sore thumb. to put it simple, haruka felt very attacked.

“that was just a saying.” she started, feeling the blood rush to her cheeks and trying to ignore the way her voice started trembling. “in japan we say i’ll work my best, because that’s just good manners. like no one questions whether morning is really good or not. that’s just common sense.” at this point haru was just rambling, so after clearing a throat she decided to get to the point. “i’m not responsible for your album, but that little part i’m in charge i will make it work. so no, thank you. i will write my verses on my own. that’s what good rappers do. we can meet before the recordings so you can edit it or something.”

setting: mbc broadcasting station· with: @fmdharu

variety shows had always been his forte but what made them even better was when he got to attend together with friends, especially ones from other groups. it wasn’t that he didn’t like starring together with alien but well, he saw his members all the time and variety shows gave him the opportunity to catch up with friends he didn’t often see in his already scarce free time, it was like the perfect combination of work and hanging out with friends.

haru was one of those friends. disregarding their contrasting concepts, minhwan was a big fan of aria and their music, on top of that the girls were pleasant to be around as well. that he liked their music however, seemed to be something the host was aware of as well as about halfway through recording he suddenly turned to minhwan,·“we’ve heard you like aria’s music a lot, actually we’ve seen it even.” and before he could even process what really had been meant by that, a clip started playing. the background of the scene he knew by heart, dimension’s practice room and when a familiar song began playing, it finally dawned on minhwan.·“wait-” he protested half-heartedly but well, it wasn’t like anyone was listening. not when a video of him dancing to nonono was playing on the screen.

the female couldn’t help but gawk at the screen, the idea to watch feeling even more tempting after her friend’s reaction. the male had always been oozing confidence, so it felt nice to see his flustered face. what was even nicer, was the video itself. haru had seen many of her dance routines being covered by members of various groups but minhwan slayed each one of them. he had it all, from authentic expression to fluid movements.

and his face; he wasn’t nervously chuckling whilst doing the choreography, as if it was the least masculine thing to do. members of alien were used to mixing their concepts after all. oh, you wanted another warrior? well, you can have stop it instead.

“woah. i’m envious.” she mused after recording stopped playing, the hosts awaiting her reaction.“minwhan-ah should become the eternal member of aria. he was just in his element, wasn’t he?” the female added, hint of playfulness coloring her voice.

this wasn’t what she had been expecting. not at all, just like the tracks for her album were carefully selected, jenna carefully selected her featuring artist too. she had a few people in mind for her solo album but haru wasn’t one of them. it was sad but true, jenna goal had been to distance herself from her group as much as possible but her company didn’t want that it seemed. they had tracked jenna down in the studio while she was working on the song and shortly after haru joined them.

that’s when the their trainer dropped the bomb and jenna couldn’t help but protest. “i already have a few-” she was cut off with a simple wave of the hand. “it’s already been decided that haru will feature.” there wasn’t any room for argument and soon the two were left on their own. “i can’t believe.”

there was a limit of haru’s obliviousness. sure, maybe she hadn’t been noticing crushes some people had on her but the girl was able to sense when she wasn’t wanted. like at that moment, when jenna trampled out of the recording studio, leaving the japanese gazing at the manager before he urged her to exit as well. it seemed like the vocalist had yet to proceed the information, being the last to be informed about the whole situation. under other circumstances she’d be one of the first ones to cheer on her fellow member but haruka was, too, treated unfairly.

she and jenna had been colleagues, not friends. despite the “besties for life” image all groups had been forcing to the fans, the daily living had been less idealistic. it’s rational, for people to not relate with everyone, having favorites and getting along with ones better than with the others. members of idol bands weren’t chosen by the bond they’ve shared, but by the number of traits their producers thought would appeal to the target audience. haruka perceived this much and was fine with it, playing a part in the industry for this long. what she didn’t grasp was why the management thought it’s a clever idea for them to form a sub-unit.

the vocalist’s words stung. maknae wasn’t sure if they were even directed towards her or jenna was just speaking loud enough to herself. “huuuuh.” she emitted a puff of air, trying her best to look for the optimistic side of the whole situation. “i’m looking toward working with you. i’ll try my best to make sure your album will do well.”