| Episode 40. Health Management Is a Skill (1)
Just as Lee Cheonghyeon said that becoming part of the debut lineup was starting to feel real, our debut was gradually drawing closer to reality.
More than anything, the biggest thing was that our group name had been finalized.
The group name, which had nearly gone as far as a soaring pillar of flame, went round and round before settling on “Spark.”
I didn’t know if there might have been a better name.
But the name the people involved and the fans from the time I had lived in must have treasured was “Spark,” so I didn’t get involved in that part at all.
Aside from that, various topics came up, such as opening official social media accounts.
Once we heard concrete plans about the group’s future, the atmosphere in the practice room shifted in a positive direction.
Should I say our spirit changed? It felt like everyone’s focus had doubled compared to before.
The intensity of practice went up as well.
Out of the total practice time, breaks decreased and the time spent moving increased.
In Park Juu’s case, since his basic stamina wasn’t exactly good, after a full day of practice ended, he would sit on the floor and rest for five minutes before going back to the dorm.
In the midst of all this, I still hadn’t managed to raise my dance proficiency any further, so I had to receive twice as much feedback as usual.
“Iwol hyung, your position!”
“Kim Iwol, your angle’s off.”
Like that.
Somehow, I couldn’t get through a single phrase safely.
‘I thought I was concentrating. Why am I like this?’
It felt like my body wasn’t keeping up. It had been a long time since I’d felt this kind of defeat, not since I first joined UA.
“Hyung. You’ve been getting the same part wrong since this morning, so wouldn’t it be faster if you practiced it separately?”
My instructor for the day was Kang Giyeon.
He had been the most fired up among us and practiced so hard that his already unstable ankle had started acting up a little, so this was his second day being excluded from dance practice.
Kang Giyeon himself said he would try moving within reasonable limits, but everyone stopped him.
He was the type who would memorize the choreography quickly anyway, so instead of making him practice more right away, we put him in charge of supervising choreography practice. And his speed at catching people who made mistakes was practically supernatural.
The problem was that I was the only one getting caught.
“Sorry. I’ll try again.”
I wiped away my dripping sweat and apologized to the members.
It was already the umpteenth time the music had stopped because of me.
Maybe I was nervous, because I even felt short of breath. Normally, I should have still been perfectly fine at this hour, but my body felt hot.
‘Is it because it’s summer?’
I wondered if the practice room itself was hot and looked around, but the other guys didn’t seem any different from usual.
Apparently, the impatience of the one falling behind was manifesting as heat. My heart hurt.
Still, I steeled myself anew and was about to stand up when Kang Giyeon, who had been sitting in front of the large mirror in the practice room watching us, asked,
“Hyung, why are you sweating so much?”
“I think it’s an expression of how worried I am that I’ll be cut for not being able to dance.”
“Don’t joke around.”
“Does my worry sound like a joke to you?”
I was always 100% serious about this.
As it was, lately I hadn’t even been sleeping properly at night because I was afraid that the day before debut, I’d hear, “We thought about it a lot… but I think we should go without Iwol after all.” In other words, I was buried under a mountain of worries.
After coming this far, if I failed to debut right in front of the finish line, I wouldn’t have the face to see my sister even after death. So of course I had to be serious.
After seeing my grave expression, Kang Giyeon didn’t press the matter any further. I guess sincerity really does get through.
Instead, Jeong Seongbin came over from the corner of the practice room carrying a towel and water and said,
“It might be because you’re nervous, hyung. If everyone’s okay with it, should we take a short break from practice?”
“Yeah… Let’s rest for just ten minutes.”
“I’m in favor too…!”
No sooner had Jeong Seongbin given permission than Park Juu and Lee Cheonghyeon spread out on the floor like raw eggs.
“Sorry. Everyone’s suffering because of me.”
“If you think like that, it’ll only burden you more. Take it easy, hyung.”
Then Jeong Seongbin handed me the towel and water he had brought.
Why was it?
Looking at the endlessly kind Jeong Seongbin, I was reminded of Department Head Nam, whom I couldn’t stand the sight of.
‘Assistant Manager Kim, are you drinking tea right now?’
‘Pardon? Ah, yes.’
‘Employees these days have it so good, having tea time while they work.’
‘…….’
‘Is it because no one around you is giving you any pressure? At a company, you should feel a little uncomfortable.’
The image of Department Head Nam, who had harassed me for thirty minutes just because I’d taken one sip of Solomon’s seal tea while working, flickered faintly before my eyes.
I also remembered how the people around us had barely managed to stop him when he tried to pick on only me, despite the fact that he himself would leave his seat for an hour saying he was going to get coffee.
And I had even quietly drunk it at my own desk.
Why are unpleasant memories so vivid? I’ll never understand.
“Hyung? Are you really okay?”
“Yeah, yeah. I’m fine. I was just thinking about something else for a second.”
“Are you sure?”
“Of course. Thanks for the towel. I’m going to go wash my face.”
I took only the towel and hurried out of the practice room. When discipline got this lax, washing my face with cold water was the best solution.
I headed straight to the bathroom, turned the water so cold my hands nearly froze, and scrubbed my face. My mind snapped awake.
After splashing cold water on my face until my skin stung, I lifted my head and saw my bright red face in the mirror. And my unfocused, dull eyes.
I knew what idol fans called eyes like these.
“I’ve got dead fish eyes now.”
Seeing myself with such a stupid face when I should have been whipping myself harder made a dry laugh escape me before I knew it.
Even if my condition wasn’t good, I had to endure it to some extent.
People couldn’t always be in good condition, and sometimes you had to work even when the situation wasn’t ideal.
But if, like Jeong Seongbin said, I was nervous because I was the only one falling behind?
‘Then I need to get my act together even more.’
After clinging to them like gum and practically forcing them to debut me too, getting nervous and holding others back would be nothing but a nuisance.
I wiped the water from my face, returned to the practice room, and got the seated members back on their feet.
“You’re all done resting now, right? Get up. Hurry.”
“Hyung, do you not need to rest?”
“I washed my face. If we want to finish the first verse today, we need to practice diligently.”
“The first verse? Can we get that far?”
“Yeah. So don’t adjust the difficulty to me. Adjust it to yourselves.”
I’ll show you the tenacity and persistence of an office worker who has to rewrite a proposal an eighth time after it’s been rejected seven times.
Perhaps my grim determination got across, because practice resumed immediately. And very intensely, at that.
Like that, we spent the entire day dancing passionately until ten at night before wrapping up.
And the next day, I would come to deeply regret that recklessness.
* * *
It was one day when I was in college.
In other words, back when I attended lectures during the day, worked as a tutor in the evening, and worked part-time at a convenience store from night until dawn.
That night, the owner, who had been in charge of the shift before mine, spoke as soon as he saw me arrive for work.
‘Iwol, your complexion doesn’t look good.’
‘Hello, sir. I guess it’s because I didn’t sleep well yesterday.’
‘Sleep? Why?’
‘I know, right? Still, I’m not sleepy at all now, so you don’t need to worry.’
I remember taking as much care as I could with my words so the owner, who had to leave the store to a part-timer who looked unwell, wouldn’t feel anxious.
Not getting a bit of sleep wasn’t a big deal to me.
My sleeping hours were always the same, and my daily routine was always similar.
After finishing even my final task of the day, my convenience store shift, I returned to my rented room and fell into a deep sleep.
It was such an incredible sleep that I couldn’t even remember having tossed and turned the night before.
That was how deeply I slept—so deeply that when I woke up, I hadn’t noticed at all until then that my pillow had become damp with a nosebleed.
And today, several years later, I dreamed of that time for the first time in a very long while.
In the dream, even the sight of myself waking up in the morning and staring in bewilderment at the blackish pillow was vivid.
‘What a weird dream to have after so long.’
Thinking back on that time, my nose somehow felt a little sore too. I wondered if that was why I had dreamed of having a nosebleed.
Unconsciously, I brought my hand to my nose.
At the same time, I realized that the pain in my nose wasn’t my imagination, and that the area beneath it was sticky.
I also realized that the sharp metallic smell of blood was wafting from under my nose.
‘No way.’
I lifted my head, desperately praying it wasn’t true.
Unfortunately, today’s pillow was also stained dark red in places. Along with the tips of my fingers.
Had I done anything extremely strenuous recently?
No.
Then had something happened that put me under extreme stress?
Not that either.
‘Then why on earth did I get a nosebleed?’
No matter how much I racked my brain while heating the frying pan, nothing suspicious came to mind.
There couldn’t have been anything wrong with my health either. Every annual health checkup I’d ever received had always said there was nothing wrong.
As if my body knew its owner didn’t have proper money for hospital bills, it had never once been seriously ill.
By morning, the nosebleed had already stopped. Thanks to that, there was no need to plug my nose, but I was out of my mind from having to wash my pillowcase at the crack of dawn.
At least it was fortunate that I woke up before the alarm rang.
If I had been unlucky, I might have shown Lee Cheonghyeon, who would have gotten up to get ready for school, a rough sight first thing in the morning.
Since I was up early, I was even toasting bread in advance when Jeong Seongbin came out from another room.
Seeing that he was in pajamas, it seemed he hadn’t washed up yet.
“Hyung? You’re up early…?”
“Yeah. My eyes opened early.”
Before Jeong Seongbin, still half-asleep, could greet me by asking whether I’d slept well in order to fulfill the Six Rules of the Dorm, I quickly pushed him into the bathroom.
Then this time, Kang Giyeon popped out from somewhere. It was a busy morning, busy enough that I had no mental space to worry about my nose.
‘Well, what’s the big deal about a little nosebleed?’
I set the toast for the high schoolers going to school on the table, then returned to my room.
Since I was up early anyway, I planned to head to the practice room ahead of time.
And thirty minutes later, in the practice room.
‘Ha…….’
It sounds really stupid, but only then did I realize it.
I had come down with a summer body ache.
Since I hadn’t been sick much in my life, I’d thought I was just in poor condition. Until cold sweat started pouring down.
I had only warmed up, but the moment my back became soaked, I felt that something was seriously wrong.
Once I could feel my fever rising even while standing still, I understood why I had sweated so much yesterday.
‘Does it show a lot?’
It would be troublesome if my face showed that I was sick.
That was because, at Hanpyeong Industries, there had been just one time when my stomach was upset and I’d practically crawled out of the bathroom on all fours, only to get chewed out viciously by Department Head Nam. The bad memory had been seared into me.
‘Assistant Manager Kim, are you staging a protest right now because you’re sick? I told you over and over that health management is also a skill, didn’t I?’
‘You think you’re the only one who’s sick, Assistant Manager Kim? I’m sick too. Who isn’t sick while working at a company?’
I don’t even remember what that man said after that. Because nausea hit me, and I made a U-turn back into the bathroom.
I took an antipyretic from the first-aid kit kept in the practice room.
And until Choi Jeho and Park Juu arrived, I did my utmost to cool myself down by fanning myself with my hand as I made a vow.
I would endure it even if it killed me.
This, at least, I would absolutely not let anyone find out! …That was what I vowed.