Chapter 26

“Should I kill you right now or do you plan to apologize to Jumi?” I asked. After that, Jumi flew out of the stall all of a sudden. The moment she saw the position we were in, both her hands flew to her mouth as she gasped.

“Oh my god!”

She immediately ran over to me.

“Sian, don’t! You’ll get in so much trouble!”

“Don’t worry.”

I pushed Jumi aside.

“Stay there.”

And Jumi obeyed me. I think she was taken aback by how serious I sounded. It was understandable, since she had never seen this side of me before.

I turned to look at C-Night again.

“So...are you going to apologize or not?”

At the word ‘apologize,’ C-Night nodded furiously.

“Get on your knees.”

I released her from my hold and she immediately fell onto her knees in front of Jumi. With tears in her eyes, she began to stammer out.

“J-Jumi…I…*sniff*…I’m really s-sor..sorry…*sniff*...”

Jumi slowly kneeled in front of C-Night. Well that was fast. Then again, this was Jumi. She had the heart of a saint. It was no surprise that she was going to forgive C-Night so quickly.

But I quickly learned how wrong I was when she clenched her fists and struck C-Night straight in the head.

Thud!

The fist made a hard sound upon impact. But I guess it wasn’t enough, because Jumi followed it up with a hard slap to the face. This was definitely the best plot twist ever!

I soon joined in, making sure to leave a few bruises myself.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

“That’s enough, let’s stop here. And don’t think about reporting us. It’s not just us who will get hurt if you do.”

C-Night nodded again. I knew she meant it. She and I were both under the same company, basically colleagues. If news got out that we were fighting, it would be bad for everyone.

I quickly walked out of the bathroom with Jumi.

“You okay?”

“Yeah. Thanks, Sian. But are you sure this is okay?”

“It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.”

I gave her a pat on the head. It was kind of ironic how worried she was when she served half the blows back there.

“But where did you learn to fight like that?”

“You want to know?”

“Yeah!”

“Well, I’m not telling~”

And with that, Jumi giggled. The sight made me so happy. I considered all the members of Fifteen as my younger sisters. I’m very protective of them.

As we were walking, we ran into Jinwoo. The moment he saw us – no, saw me – he gave us a thumbs up.

“Sian! You were amazing!”

“It was nothing,” I spoke modestly, lowering my head.

“But Jumi, what’s wrong with your eyes? Were you crying?”

My anger flared at his show of concern. Suddenly, every negative remark he’d made about us flew back at me. I wanted to give him a good one – just one – for every mean thing he had said.

Some might say my next words were cowardly, but it was simply because I didn’t want to hurt him too badly.

“Hey, Mr. Park. There’s a bug on you.”

And I quickly gave him a few jabs in the stomach. There. Done.

“A bug? Where?”

“Oh, it flew away. Well then, Jumi and I will go back to the waiting room. We’ll see when the Week 4 scores come out.”

“Oh, okay. See you guys later.”

And with that, we headed towards opposite directions. Five seconds later, Jinwoo fell to the ground. From the looks of it, it seemed like he suddenly had an awful stomachache.

***

The members of Fifteen all gathered on stage. Week 3 was over, so now it was time to hear about the Week 4 mission and find out who our new roomates were going to be. Surprisingly, Jinwoo was nowhere to be seen. Instead, it was Snake, another rapper. He was also under YH Entertainment, and was constantly at the top with C-Night. He was friends with her as well. Why was he here?

“Hi, guys. Welcome, I’m Snake. Nice to see you all.”

The members of Fifteen shyly greeted him back. I mean, he’s pretty famous. He’s muscular as well, and tall with incredibly handsome features. No wonder he’s popular.

“I know you were all expecting Producer Park, but he had to go to the hospital suddenly because of stomach pain, so I’m here in his place.”

“Where’s C-Night?” I asked while raising my hands. I truly did wonder where she was...not that I felt bad about it.

“Oh, C-Night wasn’t feeling well either, so she went home. Hence, I’m here,” Snake spoke like an older brother, almost patronizing. I guess some women may find that attractive, but it put me off. After all, I’m only a woman in body. Of course, I could feel the female hormones slowly turning me more and more into a woman. But as of right now, I was a man. I was working really hard to keep the heart, mind, and dignity of a man. I’m especially reminded of that whenever I see a woman’s curves.

“Okay. We’re going to start with the announcements for the Week 4 teams. The first seven members I call, please walk to the left side of the stage.”

We gave our complete attention to Snake. Some perhaps a little too much.

“Hey,” I said as I poked Jia. She was staring a little too hard at Snake’s face. I must say I was a little jealous.

“Oh, Sian. What is it?”

“Why are you staring like that? Do you like him?”

“He’s hot.”

“Crazy.”

I held back a string of curse words. But why am I so jealous? This wasn’t a normal type of jealousy. Was it my brotherly feelings acting up again? I wasn’t sure.

“Alright. To make it go quickly, I’ll just read the names. So…Jihyun Yoo(22), Sian Lee(21), Sena(21), Jia Lee(21), Yoojin Jeong(20), Eunmi Lee(19), and Hainan(18). You guys are one team.”

The ones he called out walked to the left. The rest walked to the right.

“Yay! I’m with Sian again!” Jia said as she linked arms with me. She was that happy, huh?

“Get off me.”

I pushed her off. Her hands were too hot.

“Now I will announce the task for Week 4. It’s a team mission. There’s fifteen of you guys, so there will be five teams of three. Jinwoo already picked the teams, so I will read them out loud.”

A team mission? That’s the most difficult. If you’re in a team with people you work well with, it’s fun and it comes out well on top of that. But if you end up with people you don’t get well with…well, good luck to you. And of course, there’s the people who work well with teams in general and others who don’t. That’s why you need all the luck during team missions.

“Okay, let’s see…Team 1 is Sian(21), Jia(21), and Yoojin(20).”

“Oh my gosh!” Suddenly, Jia let out a scream and we all turned to look at her. She gave a sheepish smile.

“Oh, sorry. I just…I’m so relieved.”

Everyone laughed at her words and Snake quickly went on to name the other teams.

“Team 2 is Yoo-young, Jumi, and Jihyun. Team 3 is Rhinzi, Liang Liang, and Ara. Team 4 is Sena, Areum, and Hainan. And Team 5 is Jimin, Eunmi, and Minji. Those are the teams. You did well today guys, and I’ll see you guys next time!” Snake said as he stood up.

“So we’ll see you next week?” Jia asked with her hand in the air. With an indulgent smile, Snake replied.

“Yes, you will.”

At that, everyone’s face brightened. Everyone, that is, except for me.

***

As soon as we were back in the dorms, I called Jia and Yoojin for a team meeting.

“What should we do?” Jia asked.

“We have two dancers, so how about a dance?”

Yoojin suggested. The youngest out of all of us. Her body, though, is definitely on the mature side.

“I like that idea, too. Sian, what do you think?” Jia asked me. The way she tilted her head made her face look very small and attractive. If my body had been that of a man, it would have definitely reacted. Not that it would have really made a difference.

“It’s fine with me.”

“But you’ve never danced before.”

“I can learn.”

“Hmm…your thing with the sword definitely shows that you’re coordinated. And you were amazing! I couldn’t take my eyes off of you.”

Jia’s eyes flowed with admiration and so did Yoo-jin’s as they both looked at me. I suddenly felt like I could fly.

“But don’t you want to sing, Sian? You haven’t gotten to sing yet.”

“I don’t really want to.”

It’s true. I’m not bad, but I have trouble putting emotion into my singing. I’m sure if I tried hard enough, I’d be able to, but it’s not very fun either…

“No. Let’s choose something we can sing and dance to. That way Sian can sing.”

“Hmm…singing and dancing at the same time?”

“If you’re an idol, you should be able to.”

” Oh.”

I knew Jia was right. In the past, anyone with a pretty face that was willing to shake their butt could be an idol. But these days, you had to be able to do it all. Singing and dancing. Only the ones with real talent could survive in the industry. Which, of course, simply meant that the public’s standards became harder and harder to meet.