#rejectz

dohee grew up dirt poor. there was no sugar coating it-- her family didn’t have a lot going for them, and though her parents only had two kids, it was probably still too many for them to afford. 

it was because of that that dohee grew up to be rather innovative. she and her mother made a lot of their own clothes because it was just cheaper that way, and though she did stick out like a sore thumb, it meant she could try new things and make things she thought was cool, instead of just buying what was on trend and on shelves. 

dohee was cast by spotlight when she was in middle school in the middle of a church choir performance, and though she had been nervous and apprehensive, there was no way she could say no. not only was there a sure-fire career path right in front of her, and one that could end up being pretty lucrative, but with dohee living in the trainee dorms, her parents didn’t have as much of a monthly cost. 

from day one, however, she was a target. she wasn’t sure why serafina joon hated her so much, but the moment dohee walked through spotlight’s doors, she was being hounded by the other girl. sera seemed to find joy in kicking dohee while she was down and making her feel like she was nothing. dohee was made fun of for her appearance, her manner of speech, the way she dressed-- you name it. if there was something to pick at, sera found it and honed in. and because sera seemed to be the queen bee, others joined in too. 

and dohee couldn’t even give up, because now that she was in, she was racking up debts with spotlight-- ones that trainees usually paid off once they debuted. if dohee left, she’d be stuck with those costs, and her family couldn’t afford to live as it was. they didn’t need one more thing on top of it.

she felt fortunate to be put in the lineup for girls journey. by the time the predebut group started working together, her self esteem and confidence were the lowest they’d ever been, so the fact that spotlight saw promise in her and saw a debut in her future was mind boggling. it almost made the incessant bullying from serafina bearable. she liked a lot of the other girls, so she tried to convince herself that if she stuck by them, debuting next to her tormentor was something she could endure.

though, she never had that chance. sera was the queen bee, and some financial ties to stockholders meant she had a lot of power that a trainee really shouldn’t. dohee was one of the first girls cut from girls journey before they became iris, at the request of sera, and dohee was shattered. it was like the last thing holding her up was the prospect of debuting, and now that she wasn’t, she was crumbling.

dohee will always be grateful to sangsuk. the others rallied around her too, of course, but sangsuk was the one who pushed for them to move on. to find somewhere else and prove that they were worthy. had she not been so broken, she might have refused, but dohee didn’t have the backbone to question a strong authority figure (albeit, that figure being a fellow trainee a year older than her). so she went along, hoping that sangsuk’s plan would work out so she wouldn’t have to go back home to her parents with thousands of dollars of debt they couldn’t handle. 

as rejectz began to form, dohee started to feel like herself a little more. she was given the role of stylist for their self-produced project, and while she didn’t really have the confidence in herself that the others clearly seemed to have in her, she took it in stride, using her background in sewing and ~trying new things~ as a kid, and applying it to trends she was seeing in the industry at the time. when they finally debuted, it felt like it wasn’t real. 

dohee has been slowly building back her confidence in the year since rejectz’ debut. being away from her abuser and among people who love her definitely helps. every comeback she has a little bit more nerve to try new things with their outfits. every comeback sookie gives her a little more challenging parts in songs. and every comeback, dohee feels a little more like the talented tour-de-force that the world sees.

For her whole life, Ahn Doah has been average at everything; school? average. Sports? average. Making friends and working? average.  Despite her seemingly limited capabilities, her parents always encouraged her to try new things. Whether it be cooking, exercising or sewing, the girl accumulated a decent skill set But she never found anything she was passionate about. Eventually at 16, she realized that the people around her were deciding their lives; some decided on science careers other decided on business, but Doah had absolutely no idea what she was destined to do. She felt absolutely behind and suddenly pressured to decide on what the rest of her life looked like.

Her peers constantly asking her what she was going to do didn’t help either and finally, after cracking under pressure she said she would debut as an idol. Classmates asked her about which companies she was looking at and while she scrambled for answers, one of her classmates mentioned they were auditioning for Spotlight and that they should go together. 

 Training for their audition was something that Doah hadn’t expected to enjoy, but the more she thought about it, the more she liked it. It combined all the things she enjoyed about her previous hobbies and then some. She moved around a lot, was creative, and could show people what her skills were for. When she’s selected as a trainee, she feels both guilty and ecstatic for her future; but that all seems to fall apart as they cut her and some of her peers off  of the final lineup for no reason.  She's devastated. After finally finding something that she could excel at, the company threw her and her friends off for what felt like no reason.  Despite her friends cheering her on, she's flaking out on herself; doubting if she even has the skills to debut, when an olive bran is extended; Higher decides that they are enough and signs them as a whole unit. Once again, she's conflicted on how she feels about her possible debut. The excitement of being on the stage pouring out of her, but the self doubt constantly plaguing her brain.

About:

growing up in a well-off family certainly afforded xinyi many privileges. dance lessons, private tutors, anything she needed or wanted was available for her. including a spot in a prestigious arts program in seoul.

when xinyi was 13, she packed up and moved away from her family to study. though she tried her best to focus on her grades, which were always decent enough, an offer from spotlight entertainment came in when she was 15. they were looking for backup dancers, and with her skills, xinyi was certainly qualified.

she spent a year and a half as a dancer, working where and when they needed her, before signing on as a full time trainee. by the time girls journey was forming, xinyi (now cindy, professionally) was one of the members chosen for the final lineup. that is, until spotlight cut more than half of the girls.

Heo Bia was raised to be unabashedly herself, and that’s something that’s stuck with her in her career.

She was the daughter of a dance prodigy and a pianist, and trained classically, but that all went out the window as soon as she took interest in Spotlight Entertainment; to be an idol, while ballet was certainly an asset, the skills required were a little more geared towards hip hop– more contemporary dances. So that’s what she started learning, with much support from her parents. Her father ran routines with her while her mother played for them; it seemed like the perfect dynamic. And Spotlight Entertainment soon thereafter took her in, beginning her training at the age of ten.

Riah has always been very forward and aggressive, and definitely had a way about her, being able to wrap boys around her finger at merely a glance. While she was still classically trained when it came to dance, she soon became an expert in the art of hip gyrating and hair flipping, all while giving sultry glances to her audience. She had a lot of boyfriends in her teens, none lasting for remarkably long. She was never really happy with them, though. Sex was fun and so were connections with people, but she found herself being more and more drawn to women. Her first (Secret) girlfriend solidified it; Heo Bia was definitely bisexual, and she leaned a lot more towards girls than guys (boys were nice to look at and cuddle with, but girls were better sexual partners and she made better connections with them).

Again, she was raised to be herself, and she made it clear with her agency; her sexuality wasn’t going to be a secret. She wasn’t afraid of the backlash. She wanted everyone to know that this is who she was and she wasn’t ashamed of it. That proved to be her downfall with the company, though. Though she’d been slotted to debut with Girl’s Adventure, her revelation was enough for Spotlight to reconsider, cutting her from the group. Soon after, too, Boyoung was cut for similar reasons, which really solidified to Bia that Spotlight wasn’t the place for her.

She followed her fellow rejects, if you will, to Higher when they offered, but when they arrived, she gave Higher the same ultimatum-- she wasn’t hiding any part of herself. And to her relief, they were okay with that, and when Rejectz finally debuted, Bia debuted with them. And she debuted as the first openly bisexual idol in the industry.

She feels a little bad-- she knows she’s not the only queer girl in Rejectz, and is a little guilty that she gets to be so open about it and they don’t, but she figures it helps that she’s bi, while at least a couple are full blown lesbians-- as archaic as the idea is, she figures fans are probably more okay with someone who is halfway straight. And she knows it’s just baby steps. She’s certain that one day. all of them will get to be open. 

About:

Sunyi may not have always been the youngest growing up, but she was the most timid. She was the first daughter born after her mother remarried following the loss of her first husband, and she she got older, Sunyi seemed to stay the quietest.

She was only nine when Hasik got discovered by Spotlight Productions, and though she missed her older half-brother, Sunyi did her best to lead a normal life. She went to school and kept her head down for the most part, though that wasn’t entirely by choice. She was so shy that she could only squeak out a response if any of her classmates ever spoke to her and just pray that the conversation would end without her somehow embarrassing herself completely. Even when she succeeded, Sunyi was still bullied constantly by her peers.  

But while Sunyi never fit in well with most of her classmates, she always had music. She first started learn to play the tuba when she was still in elementary school, she liked how big and loud it could be–which was the exact opposite of her–and if she was being honest, she thought it was a little funny too.

The tiny girl with her giant tuba was always in band from that point forward, laughing and joking with other bands kids easily, unlike how hard it was for her during the rest of the day. As she grew older, she decided to pick up another instrument as well, learning the string bass and joining her school’s orchestra as well as the band.

Four years after her half-brother joined Spotlight, the company took interest in her as well. Thought a scout noticing Sunyi lugging her bass behind her as she went to visit her brother when she was fourteen wasn’t the same as being recruited at age twelve by the CEO like Hasik had experienced, it still made Sunyi consider if the company could be a home for her brother, it could be a home for her too. Sunyi already loved music, that was undeniable, and it was through music that she managed to not just hide away from the rest of the world as much as she could.

But she knew she couldn’t show up with a tuba and hope everything would work out. Sunyi would have to not just talk to other people, but actually sing. She always liked singing, but that was to herself when she was alone, never anytime someone might overhear her. To this day Sunyi is unsure of how she passed her audition given how visibly nervous she had been, but after she was accepted,  for the first time she felt  hope that this was where she belonged.

As her brother got engulfed in what felt like a scandal that had no end in sight, Sunyi was instilled with a new fear that if she failed, she would somehow make things worse for him. Everyday that drew closer to her debut as the maknae of Iris, and the more people who payed attention to her and the other trainees, so did her brother’s notoriety in the public eye and she couldn’t seem to wrap her head around it.

Sunyi promised herself that once Iris debuted, the attention from being Hasik’s half-sister would give her the opportunity to show that he wasn’t malicious like media outlets insisted he was. But at the last moment, Iris debuted without her and all of the other members that she had grown so close to since she was barely fourteen.

When Sunyi found out that she was cut from the lineup, she was devastated. Sunyi could come up with a million reasons why Spotlight could have changed their mind seemingly without a second thought for why she didn’t deserve to debut. But she couldn’t figure out why they had done so with her friends, who felt like her sisters and were supposed to have been her groupmates.

It was their idea to leave once they had all been cut, and Sunyi knows she probably never have had the guts to stand up to Spotlight had it not been for the other girls encouraging her as they did the same. She was always too scared of failing, of making things worse for Hasik, and once she already failed to debut, she didn’t want to fail Hasik as well. She doesn’t know what possessed her at the time they left, but looking back Sunyi is thankful that she found the strength to tell the executives that cut them that they deserved to be treated better, Hasik deserved to be treated better, and she deserved better too.  

Sunyi trained for barely a year before she debuted with Rejectz only a few months before her seventeenth birthday. Though she had done all of it before, the training and nerves and gearing up to debut, Sunyi felt like she was freezing up more than ever. She was terrified of failing all over again and not being able to prove Spotlight wrong about her and the other members and not being able to prove to her family that they could bounce back from anything.

Thankfully the other members knew Sunyi almost better than she knew herself by that point. Sunyi excelled at writing her own lyrics, and helping the other members with theirs whenever they wanted her to chime in, but suddenly whenever she went to sing in front of anyone that wasn’t the other girls, she almost couldn’t move at all. So the other girls came up with the solution: give her a fraction of the lines that she normally would get, and Sunyi wouldn’t have to worry about anything else.