Chapter 82
There were only two accounts opened under Seo Siyeon’s name.
A YouTube account and an Instagram account.
YouTube was approaching one million subscribers, while Instagram had around 700,000 followers.
But almost nothing had been uploaded to either account over the past year.
Instagram at least occasionally had updates about her life, but even those had stopped six months ago.
Of course, news about Seo Siyeon herself reached fans through the members of Blooming and NOIRIS, and they could also encounter her as a producer on the groups’ albums.
But most of Seo Siyeon’s fans, naturally, wanted to see her as an artist onstage, not as a name in the credits.
“Is nothing going to be posted today…?”
Go Hye-na, a fairly devoted Seo Siyeon fan, turned on her smartphone immediately after emerging from the hell of her assignments that day.
And there was Instagram, which she logged into.
As she scrolled through her feed absentmindedly, she spotted an account that looked familiar.
“…Siyeon?”
The moment she saw the account’s name, she clicked on the video that had just been uploaded.
It was an update—the first one in half a year.
The idols her friends stanned went live practically every week… and released a song every quarter, but Seo Siyeon was different.
Go Hye-na wasn’t completely free of complaints about Seo Siyeon still not returning after a year, but Siyeon was so young that she could more or less understand.
Of course, it was a little galling that Siyeon wouldn’t show her face to fans and could only be encountered in album credits.
The girl in the video was still showing off her usual cuteness.
She seemed perhaps a little more mature than before… but her cheeks were still plump and her eyes sparkled.
If anything, her actions and expressions seemed a little more lively than before.
A small bird, sky-blue and slightly paler than her eyes, sat on Seo Siyeon’s shoulder in the video.
And she knew what kind of bird it was.
“That’s Seol-ha’s parrot, isn’t it? Was its name Jack…?”
Go Hye-na was a fan of Seo Siyeon, but she also liked Blooming.
Because it was the group Seo Siyeon produced.
It was the bird that had appeared in a video Yoo Seol-ha had uploaded recently about the one-room apartment she had found.
The background also looked similar to what she had seen in that video.
And Seo Siyeon was singing in the middle of it all.
“…?”
Seo Siyeon’s voice sounded the same as in the past, yet also a little different.
It retained the clear, refreshing quality of her old voice, but the strangely throat-scraping technique that emerged during some of the high notes was something that had never been present in her voice before.
“…This song is ‘Lovebird.’”
These days, she only listened to Seo Siyeon’s representative songs, but she had listened to this one often back when she played through all of Siyeon’s past tracks.
She remembered it being included near the end of one of her full-length albums.
She wasn’t sure, but perhaps that parrot’s species was a lovebird?
The sound of guitar strings being plucked rang out alongside the parrot’s intermittent chirps.
Seo Siyeon’s familiar vocals were layered over a sound that filled out like a harmony.
Even at a glance, it looked overflowing with romance, so Go Hye-na understood why Seo Siyeon had broken her long silence to upload this Reel.
As always, she opened the comments.
Then she saw the comment with the most likes at the very top and couldn’t hold back her laughter.
-If you think it’s outrageous that Seo Siyeon still hasn’t returned even though her voice change is over, upvote lol [Likes: 5.4k]
“Pfft… That’s true.”
She could guess that Siyeon had her reasons for being unable to return, but fans had no way of knowing, so all they could do was feel frustrated.
That was probably why comments like these were occupying the top spots.
Go Hye-na also wrote a comment, putting a small wish into words.
-Now that it’s gone this far, could you do just one live stream… pleeease…
A few hours later, she discovered that her comment had received several thousand likes.
* * *
“I told you. There was no way a single Short would make people’s complaints about your hiatus go away.”
Yoo Seol-ha had been right.
The comment section of my Reel had erupted to a degree I had never seen before. The same was true of the YouTube Shorts comment section.
I found it a little surprising that the view count was rising so quickly, but the rate at which comments accumulated was astounding.
To give you an idea, on Instagram, there were more comments than shares. They were almost neck and neck with the number of likes.
“…I guess I underestimated the fans.”
Honestly, I had expected quite a lot of them to leave after I took a year and a half off… but a considerable number of fans were still waiting for me.
It was probably because my situation was somewhat unusual.
The period since I entered my hiatus had lasted longer than the time I had been active.
However, the performances I had shown during that active period had been overwhelming.
And I was so young that my age was practically a weapon, so people could still look forward to my future.
“…Then what should I do?”
“Let’s start a live stream.”
“Hmm… I’ve never done one before. Have you, unni?”
“It didn’t seem particularly difficult. You just read selected comments and chat with everyone!”
That was the difficult part.
Maybe it was easy for someone as good at communicating as Yoo Seol-ha, but as someone like me, who leaned toward being an I—in other words, an introvert—even selecting comments didn’t make communicating live particularly easy.
“…I’ll give it a try.”
Still, it seemed there was no other way to deal with this.
Since it wasn’t difficult, I decided to show myself to the fans at least once.
* * *
Eight o’clock, when everyone had finished work and was spending their free time at home.
After returning to my studio, I used my laptop to start a simple Instagram Live broadcast.
The image of myself on the webcam looked just as perfectly cute as usual.
“Hehe…”
I was wearing pajamas with a certain character on them, which I had received earlier at Yoo Seol-ha’s house.
They didn’t have the same character as the ones she had been wearing, but I quite liked the puppy with blue ears, too.
Maybe because it looked a little like me?
The moment I started the broadcast, the number of viewers began to rise in an instant.
The chat flew downward so quickly that I couldn’t even see it, and I felt almost frightened by it.
“H-hello?”
The chat stopped for a moment as soon as I showed my face and opened my mouth, then started climbing even faster than before.
-????
-No way, is this real?
-Unni ㅠㅠㅠㅠ I missed you so much
-Wow wow
-I think your cheeks got a little thinner?
“…Have my cheeks gotten thinner?”
If they had, that could be a little problematic.
I considered my plump cheeks one of my strongest charms.
-Noooooo
-They’re exactly the same lol
-Would those disappear in just a year?
Meanwhile, the number of viewers had already passed 2,000.
Considering that not even a minute had passed since I started the broadcast, it was increasing at a crazy rate.
“Oh, today… Um, I’ll answer a few questions and then go to bed. The comments on the video I uploaded today made it seem like that’s what you wanted.”
-How many years has it been since you talked to us? lol
-When are you coming back?
-What have you been doing lately?
-Unni, please read my chat ㅠㅠ
-Is your voice change completely over?
“Ah. Yes. My voice change is over now. I’m attending a vocal academy and undergoing vocal rehabilitation.”
-You said you had precocious puberty. So you didn’t get the medication?
“Um. No, I didn’t. Instead, I’m getting growth shots.”
-Unni! Then how tall are you now?
“…135 centimeters. Still, I’ve grown quite a bit in a year, haven’t I?”
-You’ve grown by almost ten centimeters?
-I’m scared you might pass 150…
“…Your username is Lolihunter. Hmm, but I should still get past 150.”
This isn’t even an internet broadcast, so why is their Instagram username like that?
Once again, I was reminded that there were a lot of crazies in the world.
Still, quite apart from that, lately I had been a little afraid that I might not make it past 150 myself.
-Are you making music these days?
“I’m always making music. Please show Blooming and NOIRIS lots of love… Hmm? My songs? Well… I’m working on them.”
After that, a series of fairly inconsequential questions followed.
“Favorite food? Mala tang has been delicious lately. And for snacks, I like anything with matcha in it.”
“Song recommendations? Do you really have to ask… Please listen to lots of songs by Blooming and NOIRIS.”
Then one of the comments caught my eye.
-The fans are really waiting for you, Siyeon… Could you give us even a hint about when you’ll return… please…?
“My return. Right, all of you are interested in my return, aren’t you?”
-Isn’t that obvious? lol
-If you came here, then definitely.
-Siyeon, it’s about time you brought us an album.
-You said you’d take a year off, so you’re coming back this year, right?
“…There’ll be an announcement through the company later. But I’ll just say this much: my return isn’t that far off.”
Then another comment immediately below caught my eye.
-Now that you’re in fourth grade, is there a boy you like?
“A boy I like? Pfft… I’m not a little kid, you know. No, I don’t!”
Naturally, boys who confessed to me did so from time to time.
That was why I was realizing that Seonghun, who was still paying tribute in chocolate milk, was comparatively a saint among the boys at school.
At least he didn’t cause me any trouble.
If I had seen what I said going around afterward as a Short titled ‘A Baby Talking About a Baby’s Love Life,’ I wouldn’t have said something like that.