“At least he remembers that much, yeah? Not like that boy inI Loved You. Better to know the bad guys might come after you, then you can be prepared. Set traps. That kind of thing.”
You couldn’t set a trap if your life depended on it, whispered the voice of Invisible Jaehwan.I’d better be the first one you call. Eunjae shivered involuntarily.
When he wasn’t listing examples of drama plots involving amnesia, Mr. Han was reminding his wife that going five or ten miles above the posted speed limit was perfectly acceptable. Mrs. Han would nod and agree, already going around fifteen miles over and beaming all the while. Within this woman’s petite frame burned the soul of a Formula One racer. Eunjae oscillated between dizziness and admiration. That had to be a superpower, being able to take every corner like it was a hairpin turn. It was better when he stopped trying to read the signs that kept blasting past his window at warp speed. Thrilling, even.
Upon arrival, Mr. and Mrs. Han led the way to a small, two-story apartment complex. Eunjae followed them on wobbly legs. The whole building was painted in shades of forest green — the wooden stairs, the railings, all the siding and trim. Trees extended their branches over the sidewalk and reached for the second floor balconies, burgeoning with flowers. Everywhere he looked, there was something growing, blooming, bursting with life: crowded window boxes, herbs frothing out of jars, a row of tomato plants in tin coffee cans. Someone’s bougainvillea scattered drifts of papery fuchsia blossoms across a parking lot the size of a postage stamp.
There was a light in all the windows but one. He heard wind chimes stirring in the soft breeze, at least two different sets of them judging by the timbre and pitch. A sign beneath the largest of the flowering trees readIvy Lane Apartments.
Eunjae felt for the disposable camera in the bag slung across his chest. It was much too dark to take a decent picture, so he had to make do with memorizing as much of the scene as possible. Something to save for later, to warm himself when the world felt cold.
Mrs. Han backtracked for the sole purpose of resting a guiding hand on Eunjae’s back, moving him along as if he might get lost again between the car and their front door.
“Home!” she announced. “Come, come. Yeonnie parks on the street. You can wait for her inside.”
From Ari’s episode of the docuseries
Sunshine 24/7: Apollo on Tour, filmed during the group's US tour stops in late 2022
The camera follows Ari, dressed in nondescript blue sweatpants and a matching sweatshirt. His hair, grown out for the music video, is a light shade of brown and just barely brushes his shoulders. He leads the way down a corridor with plush maroon carpet, the pile so high that it swallows the sound of his footsteps. The walls are lined with closed doors.
“The first time we heard Ari sing,” says the voiceover narration, a female voice speaking in subtitled Korean, “he was fourteen years old. He came to the auditions in Sydney.”
The scene cuts to two women sitting side by side in matching green upholstered chairs: Sun Soyeon and Choi Haewon, founders of Apollo’s agency, Emerald Entertainment.
“We knew right away that we wanted Ari,” Haewon continues, “but later we couldn't decide if he should be a soloist or if he should debut with a group.”
Soyeon laughs, covering her mouth with an elegant, beautifully manicured hand. “It was one of the worst arguments we ever had, actually.”
“You know, I think people assume we never fight because we've been seen by the public as best friends for most of our lives at this point.”
Here, clips of the two women scroll slowly across the screen, showing scenes from their time as members of Jewell in the late 90s. Known as a first-generation girl group, Jewell is often listed among other forerunners of the Hallyu wave. They arrived on the scene during a massive surge in the global popularity of South Korean entertainment, including K-pop and Korean dramas.
“We fought over Ari, though,” says Soyeon, laughing again. “Oh, we went back and forth for ages. I kept saying, Haewon-ah, he can't debut alone. We can't do that to him. His mother told us before the audition that that he was very, very shy. She actually thought he might try to sing badly, sabotage his own audition so he could go home and hide.”
“Unnie kept telling me he'd be lonely on stage,” Haewon explains, referring to Soyeon as her older sister, “but I hated to think of that voice being overshadowed by anybody else's. Although there were stronger vocalists among our trainees on a technical level, Ari’s voice still managed to shine in its own unique way. What a waste, if the world never heard this boy sing. That’s what I was thinking. I wanted to just pick him up and put him on a plane to Seoul right away.”
Now the episode switches back to Ari at the hotel in New York, where the film crew records him sharing the contents of his suitcase. We glimpse clothing neatly rolled to minimize the wrinkles, a worn paperback book with a door on the cover, and not one but two different cameras. He pretends to take a picture, aiming a Nikon at three people jostling for space on the room’s other bed. (Fans have since identified these people as Max, Kei, and Jesse; known as Sunshines, members of Apollo’s fandom are legendary for their remarkable ability to identify members with only the barest glimpses of kneecaps and elbows as reference.)
Soyeon is heard commenting, “Ari has such a memorable voice. Memorable is what you want, in this business. Especially in a group, you want that strong vocal color. And there's something about it that just makes you feel…”
“Lighter. Like your feet can't touch the ground. That's for a happy song, like the lyrics are about falling in love, whatever. That joy is yours. And when the song is sad, he just breaks your heart. It's like the pain belongs to you, too.”
“He has a voice that tells a story,” says Soyeon.
The women look at each other, then nod again, almost in perfect synchrony. Slightly grainy footage fills the screen: Ari’s audition in Sydney, dated August 2011. He sings the iconic chorus of Taeyang’sWedding Dress, an international sensation released in 2009.
“To tell you the truth, I couldn't understand Soyeon’s determination to put him in a group until we saw him again in Seoul. We used to watch the trainees every Friday when they did their weekly performances.”
“That time, Ari had been matched with some boys who'd been with us longer — Jaehwan, Kazu, and Jungwoo.”
“It was crazy to me, but somehow, his voice had an even brighter sound when he was part of a group. Soyeon was right.”
“But we asked him, you know,” Soyeon puts in. “Before we finalized the lineup for Apollo, we offered Ari the choice. We felt like that was fair. Did he want a career as a soloist, which we’d support just as much, or did he want to debut with the others?”
“I would love it if Ari would finally listen to me and agree to do a solo EP, but I’m glad he’s part of Apollo. I do think he chose very well back then.”
Soyeon smiles. “He chose to stay with his brothers.”
