The Siblings Do Business Together (22)
Representative Park glanced at Eun-ho through the rearview mirror and spoke.
“Busking.”
“Busking…?”
“Every weekend.”
“Every week?”
At the word busking, even the sleepy Eun-ji’s eyes popped wide open.
“Busking? What busking?”
Eun-ji asked, turning around.
I was also at a loss for words, as it was an unexpected announcement.
“Then the recent frequent meetings you went out for…”
“Haha, that’s right. I was busy trying to secure venues in advance with the company, so we can hold at least three sessions.”
“Wow…”
“Even though your personalities are still rough, there’s nothing lacking in your singing or appearance.”
Is that so?
Although it was a short period, Lee Eun-ji and I had been developing in our own way, even if it wasn’t noticeable.
Now, we no longer had the bad habits tainted by old techniques, and we could sing all the love songs that we thought were impossible before.
We could now effortlessly harmonize our voices with each other.
So I was confident we could handle busking, too.
Great.
So great.
‘But…’
While my head vowed not to miss this opportunity,
Why was it?
My heart felt heavily burdened on one side.
“Although it’s before your debut, there’s no harm in letting people know about you in advance, so I prepared it. Above all, you two prefer singing in front of an audience rather than in the booth.”
The power of word of mouth should never be underestimated.
What the Representative said was all true.
Good songs are nice, but Lee Eun-ji and I love ‘singing’ itself.
What we loved as much as singing was the audience who listened to our songs.
When we were young, we were so desperate for attention that we played concert every day, imagining the audience.
As it was something we wished for, a spark of life flashed in Lee Eun-ji’s drowsy eyes.
‘But why on earth?’
While Lee Eun-ji was purely delighted, I couldn’t just be excited like her.
I could quickly tell where that uneasiness stemmed from.
‘I thought it was okay, but…’
The malicious comments that poured out after Lee Eun-ji passed away.
The articles maliciously written about ‘me’.
Even the honest interviews that were hidden and edited.
Back then, I just brushed it off, thinking it was no big deal.
However, looking back at that time from the returned timeline, I finally realized.
I was hurt.
Also, it seems that during the time I didn’t acknowledge my wounds as wounds, they steadily festered.
“You don’t like it, Eun-ho?”
“No, I like it.”
“Anyway, I’ll tell you about the weekend performances next week.”
“Okay.”
Although I had mixed feelings, I tried my best to pull up the corners of my mouth.
But did Eun-ji notice a little?
‘What’s wrong?’
Eun-ji tilted her head and asked with her eyes.
I shook my head silently, indicating it was nothing.
It felt somewhat unsettling, but she didn’t seem to want to dwell on it deeply.
Eun-ji grinned again, revealing her excited mood about the busking schedule.
She was so simple-minded that she seemed to have forgotten all about getting angry at Pae-op today with just one suggestion of busking.
‘Busking…’
Since we weren’t well-known yet, not many people would gather.
I thought so, having no idea what would happen in the future.
* * *
A week had passed since Representative Park’s proposal.
“My goodness, do you have a talent for making people’s blood boil? Why can’t you follow that one line!”
Pae-op sighed and held his head while looking at Eun-ji inside the recording booth.
‘Her face is unrivaled in beauty, but…’
Watching her sing makes me sigh uncontrollably.
“You’re just a trainee, so don’t interpret it yourself and follow what I tell you to do! Are you stupid? Why can’t you understand what people say?”
Anyway, I don’t like it.
I’m waiting for a chance to crush her spirit,
‘But just by looking, it’s obvious that girl is clenching her fists, barely holding back her anger…’
Whenever I corner one of them like this, that Lee Eun-ho always steps forward and bows his head first.
“I’m sorry.”
‘I dislike him even more.’
Who does he think he is, acting like a guardian just because he’s a few years older?
When I first met the two of them,
Their face-like, multi-dimensional appearance with a relaxed atmosphere,
I think I heard about it when I met with Representative Park, but after an all-night drinking session, the alcohol hadn’t worn off yet, so my memory was fragmented.
Thanks to that, I was fooled by their aura and thought they were either already debuted singers with low recognition or actor-singers…
I completely believed that.
So at first, I treated them extravagantly to match that impression.
The younger sister was quite good-looking, so honestly, I was nice to her mostly because she was pretty.
Of course, not long after, I got a huge slap in the face.
If I were to make an excuse, anyone would have been deceived.
‘Because that Lee Eun-ho was so brazen.’
Even if he were a singer who debuted a few years ago, he spoke as if he knew the work process and the industry well enough to believe it. Who wouldn’t be fooled?
‘Not a rookie, but a debut team trainee who’s about to debut…’
Ha!
Even now, thinking about it makes my teeth grind from my crumpled pride.
‘I was completely tricked.’
So it was from then on.
From the moment I found out that Lee Eun-ho was just a debut team trainee, everything he said bothered me whenever he opened his mouth.
“Excuse me, Composer-nim, the part just now, rather than cutting it off like that…”
“Hey, you shouldn’t say that. Do you know how many more years I’ve been in this industry compared to you before running your mouth?”
“…I’m sorry.”
“Instead of giving useless opinions, focus on following along properly. Again.”
What these kids were asking for was simple.
Did they ask to sing the whole track just once?
In fact, giving that kind of opportunity once or twice during long recording sessions wasn’t a difficult thing to do.
‘But…’
I didn’t want to give it to them because I was annoyed that they were trying to win the battle of wills despite being trainees.
It was absurd that trainees, relying only on their looks, were refuting my words word for word.
If what he said was really wrong, I would just think he was stupid, but whenever he opened his mouth, he said things that were so on point that it was bothersome, making me even more irritated.
Besides, what’s the point of listening when it’s obvious they’ll be lacking anyway?
“Didn’t you say the two of you have a performance in Suwon tomorrow?”
The nerve of these trainees, who haven’t even debuted yet, to show off with their mediocre skills, calling it a performance.
“Be careful not to make mistakes like you do here.”
That’s when it happened.
Lee Eun-ji clenched her teeth so hard that the sound of them grinding could be heard.
What a cheeky girl, who can’t even say a word without her older brother.
“I’ll go too if I have time.”
I said it on purpose to mock her, but that Lee Eun-ho has a really good temper.
“Please do come. It would be a great encouragement if you could be there, Composer-nim.”
“Really? Haha. Since Eun-ho says that much, I’ll make sure to go then.”
“Then, we’ll get going first.”
“Okay. Go carefully.”
The moment Eun-ho and Eun-ji left the studio,
Pae-op hardened his face, completely erasing his hypocritical smile.
‘Stubborn bastard.’
For a trainee who can’t even sing a single line properly and has to redo it countless times.
* * *
Forgotten Wounds
“It would be a great encouragement if you could be there, Composer-nim.”
I barely managed to say it while thinking that what I was spewing from my mouth was dirty crap.
Honestly, I didn’t want to see this person even on my day off.
But there was only one reason I said this.
Because my desire to pierce through those clogged ears with our voices was greater than my dislike for seeing his face.
I was twisted inside.
I wanted to shout into his ears, to tell him what kind of unreasonable standards he was holding against people.
At the same time, I also wanted to show him how we ‘sing’ when we’re not working with him.
As I took a deep breath to calm my agitated heart, Lee Eun-ji turned around with a puzzled look.
“Why?”
“I’m nervous.”
My desire to clearly convey ‘this is the kind of music we do’ through busking was immense.
But perhaps it was because it had been so long.
Whenever I thought about the stage, or more precisely, whenever I pictured people’s eyes, my chest tightened and I felt suffocated.
‘It’ll be fine.’
Since it was a pre-debut busking, there wouldn’t be many people coming to see trainees.
It was right then, as Eun-ho was barely suppressing his rising anxiety.
That evening at 6 p.m., NRY Entertainment began active promotions through various SNS platforms along with articles.
In fact, NRY Entertainment, being a small-scale agency, was not a company that could exert great promotional power.
However, the next morning,
‘E-ung’, ‘Suwon Station’, and ‘Rodeo Street’ each briefly appeared in the real-time search rankings.
***
“I heard that my beloved Eun-ho’s ★E-ung★, whom I helped with featuring, is having their first performance tomorrow at the Rodeo Street in Suwon Station! Please show them a lot of interest! I’ll go and watch tomorrow too!”
It was the result of a single brief mention posted by Ji Ye-chan on his SNS.
And then Saturday arrived.
The Rodeo Street near Suwon Station was bustling with people coming and going, just starting to choose their dinner menus.
That’s when it happened.
“What are they doing here today?”
“I saw on Ji Ye-chan’s Minsta that a team called E-ung is performing.”
“Who’s E-ung?”
“They said it’s the team that the rookie who featured in Co-sign belongs to.”
“Oh, are they idols?”
“I don’t know either.”
The staff who arrived first went about busily setting up the stage while listening to people’s conversations.
Although it could hardly be called a stage, with just two humble folding chairs, speakers, and microphones under a banner…
Meanwhile, for some reason, a considerable crowd was gathering around like a swarm of bees, following the formula that the more people gather, the more people join, whether they heard about the performance in advance or simply stopped by while passing.
* * *
“Wow.”
Meanwhile, near the subway entrance not far from the stage, a black sedan stopped.
The woman with wavy jet-black hair who got out of the car first looked around and curled her lips up.
A white shirt with neat black slacks.
A clean look without a single eye-catching accessory.
But even just standing still, her deep aura made most of the people around gaze at her.
“Hey, don’t block the way and move.”
“Just get out roughly.”
“Ah, move!”
The man who got out of the car after her, pushing aside the woman who was drawing attention.
He had a mirror-like appearance to her, wearing the same white shirt and neat black slacks.
If the woman from earlier had a fierce impression, he had a similar look but with a slightly colder atmosphere.