Episode 32. The Hunt (2)
We waited another thirty minutes, but Lee Cheonghyeon didn’t show up.
It was the point where it became certain that something was wrong with the kid’s state of mind.
*‘How is it that not a single one of them just lets things slide?’*
I found myself respecting anew the teachers who graduated dozens of high schoolers going through puberty.
“What in the world could have happened…….”
Jeong Seongbin spoke in a worried voice.
No one seemed able to guess why Lee Cheonghyeon had suddenly skipped practice.
Even to my memory, I had never heard rumors of Lee Cheonghyeon running away during his trainee days.
The fights between Choi Jeho and Kang Giyeon and Seongbin’s conflicts were things that were originally going to happen, just moved up in time—but this was the first time an event that hadn’t existed before had occurred.
*‘If something involving Lee Cheonghyeon changed from before, it’s nothing other than the debut song being switched.’*
Like the other trainees, Lee Cheonghyeon didn’t have a phone, so the possibility that he had heard anything about the debut song on his way home from school was nonexistent.
But no matter how much I thought about it, there was nothing problematic aside from Lee Cheonghyeon’s self-composed song.
*‘Or did this brat… catch on?’*
On the outside, he looked quite like a blank slate, but Lee Cheonghyeon possessed fairly useful intuition.
He was the kind of guy who, in past broadcasts, would muster his very soul to smooth things over whenever Choi Jeho or Kang Giyeon made the atmosphere awkward.
In other words, it meant he could have already completed the assumption that, given the situation, the song he composed might be used as the debut title track.
The kid who had been completely unfazed when his self-composed song was included as a b-side was mentally affected by it being selected as the title track?
Even though he had made an even more incredible song than before?
If so, the reason Lee Cheonghyeon ran away became obvious without even having to look.
*‘He doesn’t want to stand out.’*
To be exact, he doesn’t want to put himself at the forefront.
The fact that he had been so proactive after debut to the point of being called the camera director within Spark must have been fan service after all.
Maybe it was a demeanor he had developed after taking on the position of the variety member in the team and accumulating years of experience.
They exist from time to time. People who do their work well but don’t show it off.
There were more than a few such unsung heroes at Hanpyeong Industries.
The reasons they didn’t show off varied.
Because they were shy, or because they had grown up hearing for too long that modesty was a virtue.
Or because they were so busy actually working that they had no mental energy left to claim their achievements.
Then parasites like Manager Nam would siphon off their results and get promoted. Bastards.
Anyway. Right now, Lee Cheonghyeon was a high school student.
He was at an age where it wouldn’t be strange to feel burdened by the fact that a song he had somehow made for the first time was becoming the title track.
*‘So that’s why the new assignment was like that.’*
The order to secure the debut song had apparently meant, in short, persuading the runaway Lee Cheonghyeon.
I didn’t want to force him if he refused, but Lee Cheonghyeon’s song was too good to be left as a b-side like before.
Jeong Seongbin’s emotional wandering was one thing, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that things were getting tangled up by design.
Should I say it felt like the fuse connected to the gunpowder had been lit, and I was chasing after it sweeping up the ashes?
*‘First things first… I have to go catch him.’*
I picked up the athletic jacket I had folded on the practice room sofa.
I had a bad premonition that it was going to be a long day.
* * *
“Hey, how are you just going to go out when you don’t even know where he went?”
“Yeah, I think I can find him if things go well.”
A few years ago, I had wandered through bars searching for the necktie that Manager Nam had lost somewhere at a company dinner with executives.
The only clues were the corporate card payment records I’d gotten from the accounting team and the general vibe of the seat where Manager Nam had sat.
To make a long story short, I found the necktie that Manager Nam had lost that day.
From under one of the countless bar chairs in the Gangnam area.
I stopped recalling the process because I might start crying.
*‘If I found a plain black necktie, how could I not find a person?’*
Lee Cheonghyeon was a high school student; even if he moved around, he was clearly within the range accessible by public transportation.
Because all the trainees except me were living on allowance from their parents.
I started searching on the smartphone I had gotten from the manager.
Everything from the bus stops near Lee Cheonghyeon’s school to the buses that stopped at those stops. All of it.
Next, I carefully went through the criteria I had used when looking into real estate for when I wanted to quit.
*‘The most important thing is how far away you can get from the place you want to escape from.’*
How much I had empathized with a colleague who had expressed disgust, saying they wouldn’t even park their car in the direction of Hanpyeong Industries if they quit.
I narrowed it down to five places whose final stops were the farthest from Lee Cheonghyeon’s high school and UA’s practice room.
Then I excluded downtown areas or so-called hot spots.
Because I had read Lee Cheonghyeon’s answer on a post-it at a fansign before.
*If Cheonghyeon were given a free day off*
*comfortably walking around crowded places ( ) vs quietly resting in a secluded place (○)*
I even remembered that Lee Cheonghyeon had written in neat handwriting under the choices, “Recommend me a healing travel spot later!”
Despite not looking the type, he seemed to be the kind to fall deep into thought when troubled.
Besides, he was a trainee on the verge of debuting. I believed he wasn’t stupid enough to loiter around somewhere disreputable and get into scandal.
Finally, I searched “walking trails in the outskirts of Seoul” on a portal site and checked which place had the most recommendation posts.
The kid said he hadn’t even made many PPTs, so I didn’t think he would be good at searching.
At best, he would have borrowed a friend’s phone at school to search for a bit, so he wouldn’t have had much time to think either.
I checked the location that had the most influencer recommendation posts. It was a place one had to go quite a ways by bus.
When I caught this brat, I would definitely hold him accountable for going AWOL from the workplace.
I sent a firm text to the manager saying I would bring Lee Cheonghyeon back.
Of course, I didn’t forget to stop by the convenience store in front of me to buy a transportation card.
I desperately wanted to ask if the costs incurred in finding Lee Cheonghyeon could be billed to UA.
* * *
Lee Cheonghyeon sat on the bench, moving only his knees to swing his legs alternately.
Dust rose every time his feet brushed the ground.
The scenery visible below was so distant that it felt like a different space entirely.
Having grown up under a mother and father who had lived their entire lives diligently, receiving impeccable home education, Lee Cheonghyeon had never once skipped even a common after-school academy.
So right now was, amazingly, Lee Cheonghyeon’s second act of rebellion.
The first time had merely been going to the neighborhood playground with Kang Giyeon instead of the practice room, so he hadn’t even been scolded.
But having made it to the debut team and doing something like this now, he had no room to complain even if he got it severely.
*‘Is this how Gang Giyeon feels when he goes for a walk every evaluation day?’*
The day he learned that his same-aged friend had a habit of getting nervous at important junctures.
Lee Cheonghyeon had dragged Kang Giyeon, who had been holding back in a bathroom stall, outside and walked around with him for a long time until his friend’s head cooled.
He hadn’t fully understood Gang Giyeon’s anxiety. Lee Cheonghyeon wasn’t the type to get nervous often.
He had simply dragged his suffocating friend outside because he was too frustrated, but…
Lee Cheonghyeon had never imagined, even in his wildest dreams, that such a long outing would lead to his own escape.
Unlike when he had always been with Gang Giyeon, today Lee Cheonghyeon was alone. And he couldn’t untangle his clogged, stifled heart through a walk either.
The wristwatch he looked down at pointed to a time one hour past when he should have gone to the practice room.
But right now, he didn’t want to go to the practice room.
It might have been more correct to say he couldn’t go.
Because it felt like some uncomfortable news was waiting for him there.
To the point that he hoped his prediction was just him getting ahead of himself.
Lee Cheonghyeon had the shamelessness to play it off with plenty of feigned embarrassment, saying, “This is a dark history, so don’t anyone talk about it elsewhere!”
But unfortunately, Lee Cheonghyeon was well aware that his perceptiveness was faster than the average.
That his song might be used as the group’s debut title track was something he had roughly sensed from the time his roommate had been writing something like a proposal with bloodshot eyes.
Rather than believing in his colleague’s passion, it was the outcome his colleague had produced that made him think such thoughts.
After a persuasive document came out, he couldn’t help but consider the surrounding circumstances.
The agency, which had been going through trial and error adding and dropping classes even after the debut team was formed because the curriculum wasn’t established, didn’t seem like it would throw away a concept with this level of completeness.
In an era overflowing with capable and talented idols, throwing away the opportunity to attach the modifier “self-produced group” was also a waste from the company’s perspective.
Lee Cheonghyeon understood the whole situation and accepted it.
But…….
*‘What if we fail because of this.’*
By Lee Cheonghyeon’s common sense, he couldn’t understand using a song made by a high schooler as the title track.
Using a song where every part was made by himself was a different issue from being in charge of a few lines of rap.
Moreover, the people debuting with that song were the members Lee Cheonghyeon had watched by their side all this time.
He knew all too well how hard everyone had been working with debut as their goal.
Due to that, Lee Cheonghyeon wanted his colleagues to debut with an even cooler song.
Of course, all this worrying was also a problem that would end if Lee Cheonghyeon declared he wouldn’t use his song.
But this, too, was not easy.
Because, pathetically, Lee Cheonghyeon himself found it incredibly difficult to refuse an adult.
The one and only time Lee Cheonghyeon had gone against his parents’ will was when he declared he would become an idol.
For such a Lee Cheonghyeon, going against the opinion of the agency—an aggregate of adults more distant and difficult than family, objectively in the position of power, capable of actively exerting influence over his future career—was impossible.
Not to mention he had learned that Jeong Seongbin, who had been at the agency much longer than him and was practically the leader of the trainees, was being bullied by a senior singer at the same company.
It was only natural that Lee Cheonghyeon was wandering about anxiously, unable to rebel against adult society.
*‘I want to run away.’*
As he was thinking that, a long shadow fell over Lee Cheonghyeon’s eyes.
At the same time, a cold voice came from above his head.
“So you were here after all.”
Lee Cheonghyeon raised his head at the familiar voice.
Perhaps because of the backlight, his colleague and roommate stood there expressionless, looking gloomier than usual.