Two years prior

BOOM.

CLAP.

BOOM-BOOM.

CLAP.

I whip my long ponytail while May sings, her voice sweet and rich.

Haneul bursts in with her lines. 

She’s our best rapper, best friend, best everything. If we debut, we will be an unstoppable force. 

I come in with my voice. 

We all sing in harmony. An orchestral beat drop makes us all shake as the subwoofers in the dance room send shockwaves through us.

I vocalize, running my fingers through my hair and shimmying my hips before launching into the killing part of crossing my arms, then rocketing them away from my body before crossing my legs over each other and spinning around twice. 

“STOP!” Manager Hong stomps her foot on the ground. “May, you aren’t doing the leg-cross with Yejin and Haneul. FROM THE TOP!”

I hate being called Yejin. Legally, I’m Alexandra, but they stopped calling me that after I moved here from Seattle. Before I became perfect. Before I got here.

Tyler went by his Korean name too, but now he’s TY. I can only hope for the same thing.

And we start over again. I’m obviously Manager Hong’s favorite, but she usually doesn’t beat up on May as much as she is now. 

When we finish, Manager Hong’s assistant, Jaeseong, enters the room. He’s not an absolute creep, unlike Manager Hong’s old assistant, Seung. Most of the assistants are washed-out trainees like Jaeseong, but he’s pretty chill. He’s snuck us chocolate before, and let me use his phone when my grandfather died last year to call my parents. He’s only a couple of years older than us, too. I’m not attracted to him in the slightest, but he kind of reminds me of my brothers back home in Seattle. 

“Annyeonghaseyo!” We all bow to him. “Hey, girls! What’s up?” He has a swaggy, wannabe American accent he got through his years of training to be a rapper. Manager Hong interrupts him. “Jaeseong, tell the girls about the new… addition.”

“Alright.” He turns and opens the door. “Sunhi, come on in.”

A tall girl with a zit-coated face walks in. I notice her bad posture and want to correct it, internally slapping myself. We bow and greet her. Manager Hong pushes forward the tall one. “Lim Sunhi is going to be a rapper for your group. Sunhi, can you demonstrate?” 

She nods, and Manager Hong slaps a piece of paper into her hands and plays the beat of our song, STOP. After a couple of measures, she starts rapping along with a British accent that actually works well.  

Her flow is perfect, so much better than Haneul’s. 

“Alright, stop there. Aesthetically, we have some work to do. Talent-wise? You are a perfect addition to FORƎVƎRMORƎ. Next week,  all of you will be heading to the salon in preparation for your first concept shoot.”

“Manager Hong?” May raises her hand shyly. 

“Yes, May?”

“Who got today’s Best Effort Award?”

Best Effort Awards are the reason Manager Hong is so coveted by trainees. Sure, she helped create the biggest boy band of all time, 5AINTZ, but she knows about the trainee life better than most. Each day’s winner will get some extra food that isn’t nasty sweet potato or seaweed, like a small rice cake or a banana. 

“Hm, probably…”

It’s going to be me. It’s always me. I am Yejin Song. I am perfect. 

“Sunhi. Your rapping was perfectly timed.”

“Thank you, ma’am.” Her accent makes something inside me flutter, but it is quelled by rage. 

I can’t help it. After we are let out for dinner, I walk over to Manager Hong. “Why did you choose her?”

She rolls her eyes, and for the first time, I sense something other than adoration aimed at me from those sharp, calculating eyes. “Yejin, other people can do well too.”

I cannot stop myself. “But I don’t just do well. I do perfectly. Every time. Shouldn’t I always win?”

She puts a hand on my shoulder. “Yejin, sometimes perfect can get boring. Think of famous groups. 5AINTZ. DAHLIA. They all succeeded because they had something that gave them a niche. For 5AINTZ, it was the induction of your brother. TY brought his unique visuals to the table, but he also brought powerful vocals and style. He is the center not because he is perfect, but because he has flaws. People can relate to him. You don’t need to shine less, Yejin, but you need to shine especially.”

She pats my shoulder and walks away, high-heels clicking on the linoleum hallway.

Dinner for me is a boiled sweet potato and a quarter cup of steamed rice. I’m already barely forty kilograms and stand at 167 centimeters. Sometimes, even though I’ve been doing this for years, the food isn’t enough. I feel dizzy, sick, and nauseous. But I cling on. I have to make it. Then, I can eat whatever I want. 

I used to not even eat the food they gave me. I arrived chunkier than they liked me to be, but I was TY’s sister, so I was signed quickly. Soon, I lost weight, becoming skin and bones, perfect, in their eyes. It was healthy to be liked. I didn’t lose weight the way other girls did, by surgery or binging and purging, but instead, I cut myself off. Once a day, I would eat one spoon of rice and a bite of sweet potato. The rest would go to Yui.

God, I loved her. 

My thoughts are interrupted by a tap on my shoulder. It’s Haneul. “Yejin, do you wanna eat with Lila and me? Lila saved a clementine from yesterday. We can share it.”

“Sure. Where’s May?”

“Hanging out with the new girl. She barely knows Korean. She’s American, so she kinda attached herself to her.”

“I’m an American,” I say, raising one eyebrow.

“Yeah, but you aren’t as approachable. Besides, you’re K-Pop royalty. You’re TY’s sister.”

I blush. “Ugh, it’s so weird to hear him being called that. It’s been two years since he debuted, but he’s still Tyler to me.”

Haneul snorts, covering her mouth. “Imagine being able to call a member of 5AINTZ by their real name.”

“Hey, Minjun goes by his real name!”

“Yeah, but he’s the only one.”

We giggle before making our way over to Lila’s table. Lila is possibly a goddess. She’s half Kenyan and has coily hair currently dyed a bright shade of pink. Along with Sooyeon and Soonja, we have become the Visual group. Haneul has giant, expressive brown eyes, and full lips, I have the face of a female TY, and while Jian and Soonja are off practicing today, they also have the traditional beauty that has us glued together as a group. 

Because we are perfect. We have the beauty to debut. We have the talent.

As long as nobody gets in our way.

Our demo track is exhausting. I’m rapping at full speed, lips a blur into the mic. Every few seconds, Jae, our producer, yells at me to stop. “Not enough enunciation on the last verse! Stretch it out! Make it BWAAAAA, but bring it up at the end. Nice and long, so Yejin can come in with her verses.”

I’ve barely talked to Yejin, but she seems to be one of those girls at your school who you see but never chat with. Who is a thousand miles above you in social status. I remember what a girl I met in the cafeteria, Yeseul said. 

“Yejin is one of the Visuals. Watch out for her.”

Visuals. It means they're going to be everyone's favorite when they debut, and they're super beautiful. I googled it last night. They have a little group: Haneul, Yejin, and another girl with tan skin and curly pink hair. All of them are some of the prettiest girls I’ve seen in my life, Yejin especially. Haneul may not conform to Korean beauty standards, but she is beautiful in her own special way.

When I next see Yejin, she’s standing outside of the recording studio, doing vocal warmups. I can’t hear them, but I know her voice is perfect.

“Alright, continue. Remember, BORYOMMM.”

“Sunhi, that was much better. Just remember the BORYOMMM.” Jae claps me on the shoulder. “Alright, now, Yejin. Remember to trill a little on the higher notes, but besides that, you should be good.”

Yejin enters the studio and puts on the headphones. Her voice fills the room.

“Okay! Right the first time! Girls, you can learn from Yejin. May, go in.”

Lunch follows the recording, and we head immediately to the cafeteria. “Owch!” Someone pushes me aside, and I see a flick of pink hair next to them. It’s Yejin and her posse, Pink Hair glaring at me, Yejin holding her head high, and Haneul’s shoulders slumping, looking awkward and sad. 

They grab the few bananas and proceed to their usual table. May comes up behind me and pats my shoulder. “Hey, you okay? Lila can be mean sometimes.”

“Who?”

“The girl with pink hair. That’s Lila. She’s a vocalist, training for a solo career. She’s half Kenyan. She’s literally one of the prettiest girls ever.”

“Yeah,” I say, not paying attention. I am instead focused on a tall, purple-haired boy walking over to Yejin. “Who’s that?” I point at the back of his head, not being able to see his face. Something about him seems familiar, though. 

“HOLY---” May’s eyes widen to the size of lorry wheels. “Okay, Sunhi?” 

“Yeah?”

“Just promise you won’t overreact.”

The boy turns around to smile at somebody across the room, and that’s when I see his face. 

It’s TY, the center of 5AINTZ, the biggest boy group ever. Most of my friends back in London are absolutely obsessed with 5AINTZ, especially TY. “How does Yejin know TY?” I whisper to May. “Why is he here? This is a minors’ dorm. A girls one.”

“TY is… visiting Yejin.”

“Ew. That’s nasty! He’s like, what? Twenty?” 

“Oh my god, Sunhi. He’s..”

“What?”

“You didn’t see the similarities between them? Same last name, same face, it goes on and on.”

“What are you saying?”

“TY is Yejin’s sister.”

I can feel my eyes widening. 

“It’s the reason she’s so popular. Everyone wants to meet TY.”

“Have you ever met him? What’s he like?”

“Are you a Disciple, Sunhi?” 

“I’ve listened to a couple of their songs, but I’m not a giant fan.”

“He’s chill. Calmer than the whole aegyo presentation he puts on. He’s really smart, too. Total dream guy. I think he’s, like, twenty? Not sure. He’s way cooler than most guy idols. His whole voice and stage persona are super true to who he actually is. Minus the aegyo thing, since he had to do that for their last album. He’s never been involved in a dating scandal, and so on. You should meet him.”

“No way.” All the guys here I’ve seen have been immature and chaotic. We get to spend half an hour with them outside each day, and so far, they’ve done nothing but attempt to flirt and hit an older lady on the street below with a wayward ball. TOP10 Entertainment will be lucky if it doesn’t get sued. Not that it would be a massive loss of money for the biggest K-Pop company in the world.

That’s why we are so anticipated. That’s why Yejin, Haneul, and May all work so hard.

Why I must as well.

We will debut and become more than we could ever dream of, we will blow up, we will dominate, and become unbreakable.

Because we are FORƎVƎRMORƎ.