Chapter 19
“Uh…”
“Are you saying you want to do it or not?”
After Hyeona had spent a long time hemming and hawing, Iseo chided her. Seoha stared at Hyeona with a sullen expression. What did she actually think?
“No, it’s just… um… It’s hard to explain, but I’m a little unsure.”
“But?”
“Well, if you all say you want to do it…”
“If we do?”
“I might.”
Seoha wore a face that was the embodiment of confusion. Iseo looked just as perplexed.
“You don’t want to do it, but if we want to, you might? What does that even mean?”
“Uh… I guess that’s the feeling. I don’t want to do it, but if you guys say we should…”
“So, unni, you don’t want to do it, but if the others say they do, you’ll do it? Is that it?”
At Iseo’s words, Hyeona nodded. Iseo stared at her with a complicated expression.
“What are we supposed to do with that? Are we doing it or not? So if we say, ‘We’re not doing it!’ then that settles it, and if we say, ‘We’re doing it!’ then we do it?”
Hyeona nodded again.
“If that’s all, then you just don’t have an opinion, do you?”
“It’s not that; it is a no… just a weak no.”
At Seoha’s absentminded mutter, Hyeona spoke. A weak no, huh? Myeongjeon folded their arms and looked at Hyeona.
“Then what about the song?”
“The song?”
“That otaku song or whatever it is. The one we’re practicing. Even if we didn’t do that one, would you still be against performing?”
“Uh…”
At Myeongjeon’s words, Hyeona hesitated.
“No, we practiced it, so we should do it~! To be honest, I formed the band because I wanted to perform that song at least once.”
“What?”
Iseo blurted out, while Seoha reflexively questioned her words in disbelief. A conversation followed along the lines of, “Huh, didn’t I mention that?” “Not at all…”
“Well, we should try performing what we practiced at some point, shouldn’t we?”
“But you said you were embarrassed by otaku songs.”
“But we practiced it, and it’s only embarrassing at my school, or something like that…”
At those words, Myeongjeon felt they understood Hyeona’s situation. It was uncommon, but every once in a while, they had encountered students like this in their lessons: people who were inexplicably ashamed of their own hobbies.
One such student had been a young man they taught about fifteen years ago. He was a well-built young man who had initially been learning to sing. When asked, “What song would you like to try?” he spent a long time thinking before finally bringing out a song.
“Uh, would a song like this be okay…”
When he said that, Myeongjeon had replied, “Why wouldn’t it be okay?” and taught him the song. They seemed to remember saying quite a lot to him at the time, but in any case, Hyeona reminded them of that young man.
“So…”
At Myeongjeon’s words, the three of them, who had been discussing among themselves, turned to look at Myeongjeon.
“So, in the end, you do want to perform, but you don’t want to because you’re embarrassed by the song—is that about right?”
“…Uh, honestly, I don’t know…”
At Myeongjeon’s words, Hyeona’s gaze wandered from side to side before sinking downward. The weight of the words that slipped from her mouth seemed strangely heavy.
Silence descended. Myeongjeon took a sip of coffee, then cleared their throat to draw everyone’s attention.
“There’s no point in continuing to debate this or that here. What matters in the end is… You’ll do it if we say we’re going to perform, right?”
“Uh… yes.”
“Then let’s do it. We’ll go ahead with it…”
“Are you sure?”
At Myeongjeon’s words, Iseo blurted out a question.
“Sure about what?”
“Uh, I mean Hyeona unni.”
“She said she’s okay. If she says she’s okay, we do it. Are you not okay with it? If you’re not, say so.”
“No, uh, I’m okay.”
Meeting Myeongjeon’s gaze, Hyeona shook her head rapidly. Myeongjeon glanced at Iseo and spoke.
“Iseo, pick out the second and third songs we’ll perform and send them to Hyeona first. That way, we’ll have time to extract the rhythm-guitar parts and arrange them for keyboard before rehearsal. Let us know the song titles too.”
Iseo nodded.
“Make sure you have the drums down solid before you come. A month and a half isn’t enough time for the bass to get firmly in place. The drums have to anchor it. I think you’ll do well, Iseo, but regardless, there are bound to be gaps given your experience.”
“Yes.”
“Um…”
“Hyeona, sign us up for the festival. And the band name… Just put down something temporary, uh… ‘Group Sound,’ or whatever.”
“Oh, okay.”
Myeongjeon looked at Hyeona’s face. Her wavering eyes seemed to reveal her unstable state of mind…
* * *
‘I can’t believe it turned out this way.’
After fourth period ended, Hyeona thought about it as she headed out to lunch. Part of her had secretly wanted this… but honestly, the part that hadn’t wanted it was closer to the truth.
That was only natural. They were going to perform an otaku song onstage. It was bound to be embarrassing.
‘But the fact that nobody objected…’
Should she have realized from the start, when they chose that song for their first rehearsal? Am I the only one who’s embarrassed? No, shouldn’t anyone be embarrassed about bringing underground culture into the mainstream? Otaku culture is underground culture.
As for Somat-nim, they pretended to be an otaku and someone who spent a lot of time on online communities, but they were fundamentally a normie, so Hyeona had already expected them not to object.
But what about the other two? Even if she excluded Suyeon-nim, who knew absolutely nothing about that stuff—she was the kind of person who called Japanese anime “cartoons”—what about you, Horang? Didn’t you used to hate that kind of thing? You were the one who would say things like, “I don’t do otaku crap,” whenever I tried to sell you on some masterpiece…
“Hyeona. Come with us.”
Someone caught up with her from behind as she walked. When she turned around, it was a classmate—the one she always ate lunch with.
“Why were you trying to leave me behind?”
“Oh, I was lost in thought and wasn’t paying attention.”
“You weren’t trying to ditch me, were you? Heheheh.”
Two more joined them, and they went to eat lunch together. The conversation along the way was always the same: Did you see that yesterday? I saw this yesterday, and so on. Who’s annoying, who seemed nice, that’s awesome, that’s insane, and so forth.
“That one was pretty good.”
“Right??”
While the kids talked, Hyeona desperately timed her opening and jumped in. When she saw her comment met with agreement, she inwardly breathed a sigh of relief.
Hyeona’s middle-school years had been relatively livable because she had met her internet childhood friend, Yoo Seoha, in real life. But after those days ended, high school had been an environment she found difficult to adapt to. There was no one to hang out with—or even greet—or eat lunch with.
So she had desperately searched for a way to fit in, and this group was the result. To join their conversations, she slogged through dramas and other content she had no interest in. It was the kind of group that was difficult to fit into otherwise. She would rather play piano or read comics with that time.
But Hyeona was far too conscious of what the people around her thought to do that.
‘I don’t want to end up like those kids…’
The so-called otaku group. They weren’t openly bullied or discriminated against, but they were subtly looked down on and laughed at.
Hyeona didn’t want to be part of that kind of crowd, so she forced herself through strange content she found neither fun nor interesting in order to spend time with these kids, but…
“Bocchi is seriously amazing. How did they make such great songs? It’s absolutely a masterpiece of an anime.”
“What are you talking about? There’s K-On.”
“That’s already out of fashion… though.”
It was impossible for her ears not to perk up at talk like that.
* * *
“Enough!”
Perhaps because of what had happened during the last rehearsal, Seoha flinched. Was it me again? It didn’t seem like it this time. I didn’t make a mistake this time, did I?
“Keyboard! Why aren’t you concentrating? It’s not just this part; the whole performance is falling apart. Why do you keep doing this?”
“Ah… I’m sorry.”
“Think about the fact that we don’t have much time left. We still have to play three songs, but thanks to someone, we haven’t even completely mastered one, let alone three…”
At that, Iseo snickered, and Suyeon raised an eyebrow as she looked at her. Iseo fell silent at the gesture.
“If even the keyboard player we were counting on is like this, we’re in trouble. It throws off the schedule. Am I supposed to do a one-woman show onstage? Should I go up there with a double-neck guitar? Want me to show you Jimmy Page?”
Hyeona lowered her head. Suyeon twirled a lock of hair, then left the room after saying, “Let’s take ten minutes for now.” Silence followed.
“Unni, what’s wrong today? You were doing fine before.”
“Uh… I can’t seem to concentrate.”
“Don’t tell me you’re still hung up on whether we’re performing or not?”
Hyeona made an “Ugh” face as if the words had hit a sore spot, and Seoha threw her head back when she saw it.
“Hey. You’re still hung up on that?”
“No, put yourself in my shoes.”
Cutting Seoha off as she nearly shouted, Hyeona spoke.
“Right now, I’m just fading into the background at school with no presence, living my life while people say, ‘Oh, she’s an arts high school student~,’ and then suddenly I’m in a band. And it’s playing otaku songs. If that happens, do you think people will say, ‘I didn’t know, but that Jeong Hyeona from Class 2 of sophomore year—the girl who plays piano—is actually really good at music!’? Or will they say, ‘Hey, that Jeong Hyeona from Class 2 of sophomore year is a total hardcore otaku, kekeke’? Don’t you get it? Don’t you understand how I feel?”
“That’s just being overly self-conscious. I played metal at school when I was a freshman, remember? I was in full stage makeup and pounded the drums like crazy, and people just went, ‘Oh, she’s in a band~’ and moved on.”
“That’s because you’re a total extrovert, Horang! I can’t do that!”
“Seriously, she’s impossible.”
The atmosphere grew increasingly heated. Looking troubled, Iseo patted Hyeona and spoke.
“No, calm down. Seoha unni wasn’t trying to criticize you; she was just saying you shouldn’t worry.”
“Right. I’m just saying, don’t worry so much.”
“How am I supposed not to worry… haah…”
Hyeona collapsed into her chair. Overly self-conscious… She knew what Seoha meant. She also knew that there probably weren’t many people who would pay her much attention. At the same time, though, she could picture a future in which many people did pay attention to her—a future in which they laughed at and teased her.
“Don’t stress.”
“How am I supposed not to stress…”
“At this rate, you’ll make the ground cave in. Come on, let’s not do this. Let’s focus hard and finish practicing first…”
“Finish practicing, and then?”
Iseo’s words seemed to suggest something more. Hyeona stared blankly at Iseo’s mouth.
“Let’s ask Suyeon to go somewhere with us. Okay? That’s all right, isn’t it, Seoha unni?”"],
notes":"Adjusted the title to match the established split-chapter format. Replaced guessed pronouns for Myeongjeon with neutral phrasing, corrected ‘arts-college student’ to ‘arts high school student,’ and smoothed several awkward expressions without changing the tone."} JSImport 天天中彩票APPjson.validators.Invalid JSON likely extra comma after array? I put `],