by J. S. Lee
“Are you JongB’s parents?” I asked them.
“You know our son?” her eyes moved from my hair to my camera. “Are you his girlfriend?”
“Honey, you can’t be asking that. JongB shouldn’t be dating, remember,” his dad said, giving her a pointed look. While JongB’s mom had a Korean accent, his dad sounded like he had been born and raised in Chicago.
“I’m Kate,” I introduced myself with a smile. “I’m the group’s photographer.”
I didn’t miss the pointed look JongB’s mom gave her husband. “I am Jongsub’s mother.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Mrs. Im.”
“No, call me eomma,” she told me. That was the Korean word for mom. “This is Tom, my husband, and our children, Mina, and Robin,” she said, Robin sounding like it had a ‘w’ in it. Robin was watching me warily. If I had to guess, he was the middle child. Maybe eleven? Mina, definitely the youngest, was about three.
“Does JongB know you’re coming?” I asked them, politely. His mom kept giving me strange looks and it was making me feel slightly uncomfortable. They weren’t disapproving, but it was like she was trying to work out if she was going to approve of me or not.
‘Eomma’ – lord that felt weird. I didn’t even call my own mother ‘mom’. Her choice, not mine….
Jongsub’s mom shook her head. “We wanted to surprise him. Ryan spoke to Manager Sungmin and he arranged for us to be able to come today.”
“Let me take you to him.” Much as I wanted to pretend that I was doing it with one hundred percent good intentions, I was feeling hella awkward. I wanted to get out of there before she pulled out a notebook and took a very detailed look into my past.
“That would be lovely,” she agreed, allowing me to lead the way. We had barely gotten to the stage before the questions started. “Tell me, what year were you born?”
“Joomi!” Tom exclaimed in exasperation. “Leave the girl alone.”
I had not woken up this morning expecting to deal with in-laws.
Holy shit, I nearly dropped Mina as that thought ran through my head. In-laws? For the interest of Mina’s safety, I pushed that thought right out of my mind.
Backstage, I led them to the green room. No one was in there. Onyx were still busy with their interviews, but it didn’t seem like a great idea to have JongB’s family burst in on them. I was going to leave them there, find Sungmin, and then wait for them to finish up.
The idea was great in principal. Mina put a stop to it though when she refused to let go.
“I’m very sorry,” Joomi apologized, looking anything but. “You’re very good with children. You’ll make a great mother.”
“Joomi,” Tom warned in a low voice. “Behave.”
“It’s OK. Take her with you,” Joomi continued, ignoring her husband. “If Mina likes you, I trust you.”
I was torn between not wanting to take a small child with me and be responsible for her, and equally, not wanting to be in the same room as Joomi for much longer.
Mina and I went for a walk.
She spent the entire time chattering away at me in a hybrid combination of English and Korean. I had no idea what she was saying – not because I couldn’t understand the language, but because she was talking utter nonsense. It was kinda cute…
“Why does Kate have a kid?”
I took two steps backwards to the doorway of the room I’d just passed. Onyx were in there and it looked like they were done with the current interview. I found Jiwon watching me in disbelief.
“Kate has a kid?” JongB repeated, stepping out from behind Xiao’s large frame. His gaze fell on Mina. A heartbeat later, the confusion was replaced with shock. “Is that…?” not waiting for my answer, he charged over, trying to scoop his sister up.
Mina, alarmed at his sudden appearance, promptly burst into tears, burying her head in my neck. “Hey,” I cooed at her, stroking her hair. “That’s your brother. JongB.” I shook my head. “Jongsub.”
JongB, looking slightly hurt, slowly moved into her line of sight. “Hi’ya Mina Bean. It’s me. SubSub.”
At that, she lifted her head, the crying stopping. “SubSub?” Mina wiped at her eyes with her fist, then stuck her hands out. JongB scooped her up, showering her in kisses as she giggled away.
“What are you doing with Kate?”
Slowly, the others had been surrounding JongB and his little sister. Jiwon arched an eyebrow. “There’s no way you’re related. She’s cute.”
“She’s my sister,” JongB assured him. He looked at me. “What are you doing with Mina?”
Youngbin rolled his eyes. “You’re asking that like you’re expecting her to respond with ‘I found her outside’. Why do you think she’s here?”
JongB’s mouth fell open. “My mom’s here?”
I nodded, finally finding Sungmin in the crowd. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t sure if you were still in the middle of interviews, so I asked them to wait in the Green room.”
“We had just finished,” Sungmin responded. “Onyx were going to soundcheck, but we can take a break for a bit. Go see your mom, JongB.”
JongB didn’t stick around for Sungmin to finish the sentence. He was already out of the door, charging back down the corridor I had come from.
MinMin stepped in front of me. “Kate, did JongB’s mom have a bag with her?” he asked. He sounded solemn, but his eyes were shining with excitement.
“No,” I said, frowning as I thought about it. She wasn’t even carrying a handbag. “But his dad did.” He’d had a rucksack. Two, if I remembered correctly.
MinMin and Youngbin shared a look before they ran out of the room after JongB. “Wait up!” I heard Youngbin yell. Even Sungmin was gleefully hurrying after them.
I turned to CX who looked as confused as I did, then to the only other member left in the room. “Ppopgi,” he said, simply.
That meant more to CX than it did to me. “And that would be?”
“Candy,” Xiao replied with a grin. “His step-dad makes it.” He held out his hand to me, then he quickly changed it to a point towards the door when he remembered we weren’t alone in the room.
I led the three of us back to the Green room. It was full of lively chatter and laughter. JongB was still holding tightly to his sister, but while he was talking to his mom, she was being entertained by Jiwon playing peekaboo. I was certain she was too old to be playing that, but she was giggling away like it was the best game ever.
MinMin was playing on one of his handheld consoles with Robin opposite on his own. Meanwhile, Sungmin was deep in conversation with Tom. And everyone in Onyx had a piece of candy in their hands.
I pulled my camera around and started taking shots. I had no intention of sharing these with Atlantis, but rather, sending them to JongB later. I got the impression none of Onyx got to see their families often. Xiao had confessed it had been over ten years since he’d last seen his.
Time seemed to speed up, because all of a sudden, Sungmin was announcing Onyx needed to touch up their makeup and get ready for the fan meeting. I made sure to grab my camera bag and hurried out to the main hall.
VVIP fans were already filing in, filling the venue with excited cheers and chants. In the middle of them, taking their seats, were JongB’s family. The fans around them seemed completely oblivious, lost in their own anticipation.
Finally, Onyx came out, taking seats behind a table. It took about three minutes for JongB to spot his parents, and his head whipped around to the backstage area, then back to them, several times. I couldn’t fault him; I’d been expecting them to watch from there, rather than in the middle of the fans. He couldn’t keep the grin from his face, even during the high touch event when, instead of giving him a high five, his mom leaned over and kissed his cheek.
There was hooting in the audience to start with. The cheers I caught were claiming things like “even mothers love him”, and then, clusters of people were turning to each other, asking if that was his family.
&nbs
p; Whatever they found on the internet, it was confirmed on the group photo. I had been about to walk over to the venue staff and tell them to let them go as just the four of them, rather than the standard group of ten, but Tom waved me off with a grin.
His mother had been talking to a group of girls at the front. They let out a squeal and allowed the family to move to the front. My gaze flicked to JongB who suddenly looked terrified.
And then the greatest thing I had ever seen happened.
JongB’s entire family had the cheesiest grins on their faces as the filed over, ignoring every order that was being barked at them by the venue staff to go to the end (where CX and MinMin were), but instead, Joomi and Tom stood either side of JongB, Robin and Mina at the front.
The rest of the girls going up filed either side of them, some giggling at the idol they were in front of, but all half keeping an eye on JongB’s family. I could see the rest of Onyx trying to be polite and focus on the fan with them, but they too were curious.
Then the family took their coats off.
The whole room seemed to burst out in laughter. Even I was trying hard not to laugh so I could keep my hand steady as I immortalized this moment.
Until now, it hadn’t registered with me that they had their coats on the whole time. The venue had been cool, especially backstage, and then I had been caught up under the stage lights, warming up.
Now I knew why.
All four of them had homemade t-shirts on. Each one had a picture of JongB from his childhood.
Mina’s was of JongB in the bathtub – he had to be about her age at the time. ‘SubSub in the TubTub’ and at the bottom ‘(That’s my brother)’.
Robin’s picture of JongB had him about Robin’s age too. This time, JongB was wearing a dress and someone, possibly himself, judging from the marker in JongB’s hand, had drawn ‘makeup’ on his face. At the top it said, ‘Someone else does his makeup now’, and at the bottom, ‘That’s my brother (honest!)’.
Tom’s was JongB at his oldest. I’d seen the image before. It was a still from a pre-debut music video. JongB had a yellow mohawk. Not blonde, like it was now, but yellow like mustard. He was wearing a pair of denim shorts and an orange Supreme t-shirt, which didn’t look bad at all (unlike the questionable hair). Until I read the caption: ‘We told JongB he could be anything. He chose to be Bart Simpson.’
By comparison, his mom’s was very sweet. It was a picture of him wearing a suit, maybe about fourteen? He had his cute dimply smile, and unlike the standard haircut all Korean boys seemed to have in high school, his was swept to the side, rather stylishly. The caption, surrounded with the emoji with hearts for eyes, said: ‘Proud mother of Jongsub’.
JongB looked like he didn’t know if he should laugh or cry. Everyone else was still laughing. I was busy snapping away, capturing each moment as he, and the other members of Onyx, read all of the t-shirts.
And then it happened.
The moment which trumped the previous one.
His mother turned around.
The shirt.
Holy shit, the shirt.
This side had a photo taken by a fan site. JongB was wearing a very tight pair of leather pants, which, in that frame, did not hide anything. And that was it. The boy was topless.
Only, this one had been doctored by his mom. She’d made a little outfit and stitched them onto the photograph. Not only was he wearing a new pair of pants, and what actually looked like a woolen sweater that she had knitted herself, she’d even given him a coat. ‘JongB needs to wear some clothes or he’ll catch a cold!’
By that point, I couldn’t even see the photographs I was taking because I was crying with laughter. JongB looked mortified.
Then, to put that cherry on the top, she draped her coat over his shoulders.
The show was just as entertaining. Taking everything good naturedly, JongB changed all his routines. They had several outfit changes, and in each one, JongB came out wearing oversized sweaters, and for the song where that photograph his mother had on her shirt came from, he was wearing a Pikachu onesie. I had no idea where that had come from but, combined with the fact he made all his moves cute, instead of powerful and sexy, I knew he was doing it for his mom’s benefit.
Even the audience didn’t seem to mind. There was one moment where Xiao tried to lift JongB’s shirt up and the crowd booed. JongB’s mom stood up on her chair and made a giant heart above her head to the audience.
Considering I was denied the opportunity to see a semi-naked JongB, especially in a country where I’d noticed they didn’t hold back their sex appeal, this was one of the most entertaining shows I had been to. By the time I got back to the hotel room, my cheeks and sides were aching from all the laughing.
It was late when we got back to the hotel. My intention was to download the photographs to my laptop while I showered, then get an early night. Onyx were out the following day, JongB at his parents, the others… I had no idea… but it meant I had time to work on cleaning up the photographs for Atlantis.
I was busy drying my hair when my phone started chirping at me. I picked it up, surprised to see Holly was FaceTiming me. “What the hell, Kate?” she demanded, the second her face loaded up.
“Hey, dude,” I greeted her warily, wondering what I had done.
“Don’t you dare ‘hey dude’ me,” she snapped. “Your boyfriend put you in the hospital?”
“Oh!” I said, though it was more like me mouthing the word than actually speaking it out loud. “That.”
“Yes, that,” she said, again clipping her words as she glowered at me. “Why on earth am I finding out through legal that your boyfriend put you in a hospital?”
“OK, first of all, Damien is my ex-”
“Damn straight you broke up with him after that.” She folded her arms and glowered at me.
“I broke up with him long before that,” I corrected her. “Last year. And actually, he broke up with me.”
The anger slipped from Holly’s face. “You never told me,” she said, slowly. I shook my head. “Why?”
“You were in the middle of all that shit with H3RO and your dad making you Vice Chairwoman. I didn’t want to bug you.”
“Bug me?” she repeated, her eyes wide with disbelief. “Kate, you’re my best friend. I don’t care what I’ve got going on, you can always call me.”
“I know, it just didn’t seem as important.”
“If it’s important to you, it’s important to me. What happened?”
“Just a sec,” I said. I shuffled backwards, relaxing into my pillows and plugged my phone in before the battery died. “If I’m honest, the relationship ended ages ago. At some point we just ended up being roommates. When I got back from Seoul last time, he’d changed the locks and moved someone else in.”
“Bastard!” she shook her head, leaning in. “Then what the hell happened in Vegas?”
“He showed up after the concert to talk. I didn’t want to and went to leave, and he grabbed me. I fell into a wall and ended up with concussion. To be fair to him, I don’t think that was his intention,” I told her.
“Seriously, Kate? Did you really just say that?””
“OK, woah,” I told her. “Calm your tits. He was being a dick, I’m not going to deny that, but in that instance, I don’t think he went there to hurt me. However, he did. We went to the hospital and the doctor told me I had concussion. I didn’t tell you about any of that because, well, I had concussion,” I repeated. “I was more concerned about being able to do my job in L.A. and not let anyone down and my memory was a little weird. It took most of being in L.A. for me to feel normal again, and at that point, I thought it was done with.”
Holly opened her mouth as though to say something, and then closed it.
“Just say it,” I said, rolling my eyes.
She opened her mouth again, but then sighed. “I want to ask you, Kate, but, equally, I have a feeling I don’t want to know the answer.”
Honestly, I had a
feeling I knew what she was going to ask, and part of me wanted to keep it quiet, especially considering what her job was, but equally, she was my best friend, and frankly, sometimes you just needed to share a secret. “What if I had a chat with my best friend, instead of the Vice Chairwoman of Atlantis Entertainment?”
Holly let out a long sigh and nodded. “I’d like that. I have things I need to tell you too.” She rubbed at the back of her neck. “But first, let me finish being VC Holly?”
I nodded.
“What the hell happened in L.A.?” she demanded.
I shrugged. “Apparently I lost Damien the Dick’s gardening contract with the casinos, and now he’s set to ruin my career.” I frowned. “I guess he doesn’t know I’m working for you, otherwise he’d have gotten in touch, but I would expect something from him at some point.”
“And I’ll tell him to fuck off,” Holly said, bluntly. I had to fight back the smile. Holly didn’t cuss often. It was usually me turning the air blue. “Sungmin said you went to the police with CX?”
“CX happened to find us and scared him off,” I confirmed. “Then he went to the police with me. I’m sorry, I tried to keep him out of the police station, but hopefully nothing appeared in the press?”
“I wouldn’t care if there was,” Holly told me, firmly. “Neither of you had done anything wrong.”
“Yeah, but mud sticks, doesn’t it? And didn’t his last group break up because his leader punched someone?”
Holly nodded. “Yes, but there were extenuating circumstances there. Not that I condone violence, but I know why he did it.” She sank back in her chair and puffed out her cheeks. “Do you remember being in college, when the most stressful thing was trying to get our assignments written?”
I arched an eyebrow. Holly had been one of those students who would insist on doing her assignments as soon as possible and handing them in long before the deadline. She stressed at everything. But hell, I did miss being at college.
“Oh,” she frowned. “Just give me a moment.” This time, it was her turn to pause the conversation. She leaned over and picked up her landline phone. Speaking in Korean, she asked her assistant, Inhye, to hold all calls for the next half hour. She settled back into her chair and nodded. “OK, that’s me clocking off for half an hour. Spill.”
