Withering Soul

Step of My Career

After two days, some new trainees arrived at the house and we welcomed two other friends to join us in the room.

“Hi, welcome. I am Lucky Shin and he is Zev Lee”. I greeted them by bowing my body. I tried to get myself on the ground, so that was how it felt being gathered with all the good-looking people. They were all handsome and tall. Maybe because I was the youngest, they were all taller than me.

“Hi, I am Jude Young” said the one, who was the tallest of us all. I was trying to predict he must be from abroad. “15 years old, from New York” See? But looking at his appearance, he might be a mix, not purely American. “I am a Chinese American”. We whispered in long oohhh… then the last person.

“Hi, I am Sarang Park, 14 years old, from Jeju” but his English was good. And later we found out, they gathered us in the room especially for those who spoke more than 1 language, to help Jude adapt to the place. Not only English, the four of us could speak 3 other languages. Korean, Mandarin, and Japanese. It’s just different in grade. I could say all of us excelled in English. I could speak all four languages well. Jude struggled a bit with speaking Korean. While Lucky and Sarang were on their way to mastering both Japanese and Mandarin well.

We soon had a meeting that night. The twenty of us gathered in the living room and some other people came to visit us. I saw Ms.Lee. They introduced themselves as our managers and bodyguards. That we had to obey their instructions. There were 7 of them. 1 of them acted as their leader, the one who was responsible for the being of 20 of us. He introduced himself as Mr.Bruno Park and it happened that he was directly responsible as the manager in our room, the four of us. Rules and regulations were served. Maybe that was how they made their work run easily. There were too many rules, in my opinion, and it made me hate that place even more. Mom had always helped me with all the trivial things in my life, such as taking care of my clothes, stuff in my room, everything that I needed. In that place, we were simply asked to be responsible for any detail in our lives. A kind of emotional feeling burst out through my tears. I didn’t realize it. Lucky poked me and whispered.

“Hey, stop that. They can see your crying. C’mon” I tried to stop while listening to many other things that needed to be done during our time there.

We all started as a team. And a schedule of activities was shared for the next three months. My eyes jotted down activities for the next day; an introduction class to dancing, vocal/singing, and music production. The schedule started in the early morning. When I was still at home, I would still be in bed hugging my blanket and sleeping peacefully. But in that place, I had to be ready for classes. And the most cringey thing was, cameras were everywhere in the dorm and in the classes. And some cameras will be activated in our bedroom on schedule. At that rate, I found that the only camera-free space in the place was the bathroom. No, it was even scheduled when it was needed. Simply, our life was filmed 24/7. I exhaled a soft breath, releasing my negative emotions. They explained the importance of the filming, because we were all going to be celebrities in no time, so we should get used to it, no matter how hard it felt. And the compilations of the filming will be used someday for our documentary, if, just in case, we made it to debut successfully. When I jotted down another section of the information, about clothes. We were expected to dress ourselves as well-presented as we could.

'Oh god, how can I dress myself at this rate? It’s been done by mom my whole life'. I complained at heart, still holding my tears, my dislikes about the place, was about to take over my whole being.

We ended the meeting and right at that time, some packages and suitcases were sent to the living room, sent to all of us. My name was called and I got a suitcase, a big one. I dragged it to my room and opened it. I found a small folded piece of paper and opened it. From mom!

Our dearest son, Zev.

You will need this. Dad and I tried to search for branded clothes on trend hoping that they would be useful. Try to discuss with your manager about the mix and match. And if you need anything, your manager will talk to Ms.Lee. Ms.Lee will contact me. But they say we can’t do it too often. Be kind and humble, Zev, we know you can do it. We love you!

Dad and Mom

After crying my heart out, I organized all the clothes in my closet. They were all new. Well, yeah, they might be useful. And I started to pull myself together. I should stop hating the conditions and try to mingle in the atmosphere.

I have to say that things were harsh. Saying it was difficult was not right. It was harsh. Not all of us were ready to be filmed 24/7. Some of us wanted to fight. Some of us wanted to throw hate away. Some of us wanted to do things they thought were not right. Yes, I thought the schedule was given for only three months on purpose. In those three months, we lost 5 people from the team. They quit or casted away for crying too much, being moody and caused conflicts amongst us and couldn’t focus on the agenda, some of them smoked, some of them often came home late for dating outside, some of them couldn’t abide by the rules and instructions. They went home. Only 15 of us were left. To make the room more spacious, Sarang moved to another room, and the three of us stayed in our room, Lucky, Jude and I.

I started to enjoy the classes. I succeeded in shifting my mind to the main thing in that place; our classes. I gave it my all. I loved doing them all. Dancing, vocal/singing and music producing. I don’t know if I really enjoyed it because I enjoyed doing it, or maybe I just conditioned myself to enjoy the things I could enjoy the most in the place. Being filmed every time was not a matter anymore. I was lucky being in the same room with Lucky and Jude. Maybe because Lucky had experienced that kind of life before, he was able to stir the life in our room well. We almost made it 0% conflicts and we focused on our goal, to go through the monthly evaluation successfully. Because in the end, the chosen members would be taken based on the evaluation. Lucky made it to the top 5, Jude and I were happy being in the top 10. And we still didn’t know how many members they would make in the group of debut. And our manager often teased us, saying they might not even have a chance to choose because, most often, most of us failed in the process and went home. At first, the joke was creepy to us. But when it was said over and over, it became funny. And Jude, maybe because he was from the USA, was very humanistic, he could easily mingle well in every situation and with any kind of person. More like, he was always able to act professionally without failure. But we didn't attach to each other emotionally and personally, he was too professional. That's why I was closer to Lucky than to him, but I can say, the three of us in the room were living in harmony.

Lucky and Jude were much more ambitious than me. In one of our conversations, they stated their stand, they had to make it that time around or went home, meaning, their only choice was to join the group to debut no matter what. While I, I could only tell myself to do my best and enjoy it to my heart's content. But seeing how much they wanted it, I secretly dismissed myself from the map. As best as I could, I wanted them to get the spotlight and put their name in the higher rank in the monthly evaluation. I repeatedly told myself, ‘Zev, let’s do it this way, while making sure what you really want buddy’. Yes, I did it that way. I slowly subsided my energy to show my best, but to enjoy being the youngest brother in the team.

And it was around that time. We were at the peak of pressure,7 months before our debut, and only in three months, they were going to make a fixed concept about the boy-group and the formation. How many members would be in the group? Meaning, some of us would finally be discharged. There were only 10 people left. Each room was occupied by two people. Jude joined Sarang in another room, Lucky and I stayed in the room.

I could smell the tension. All of them deployed their whole energy and did all their might to top the rank and to make their debut. I could say that the ten of us were the best, even though, I should say, one or two of us were only genius at hiding our true selves. And none of us dare to open up about what happened. But for sure, time will prove it. And I was getting sure that I wouldn’t make it and was about to think of another way to switch steps in my career.