I’d needed that long just to slow my heart rate to a more manageable pace, and I’d had to grab several paper napkins from the buffet table just to dry my palms and neck.
Nervous energy made me jittery, like too much coffee on an empty stomach.
It wasn’t too long after the last interviewer came back out that the organiser walked over to the temporary staging platform, and just as she had done earlier that morning, claimed everyone’s attention by simply standing there.
“Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming this morning. All interviews have been concluded. We will now move onto to the photography portion of the event. Please be aware this will be a group session only. You will be invited to come forward in groups of five. We will not be prolonging this due to the strict timeline the group has today.”
As she spoke, the group members filed through the door, guided by Youngsoo and another person I didn’t know. They each stepped onto the stage and stood behind the organiser.
She went on to provide further instructions, which I only half listened to while I went back and forth with myself about whether I actually had the gall to go up to the podium and use my phone to take photographs of the group.
Frequencyhadn’t deemed it necessary to assign me a professional photographer for this one part. My editor had said photos at the event were a bonus, but not necessary, since they were expecting to mostly use the footage and images from the concert and awards show.
With this information, I’d just made up my mind to spare myself the embarrassment, when my group was called, and like a bloody Lemming, my legs propelled me towards the stage, seemingly on their own accord.
I couldn’t stop. I was committed to the action now, made worse by the fact the members had clearly spotted me, and whilethey mostly made the effort not to look in my direction for too long, it would look even worse if I ducked out now.
My face was flaming by the time I made my way to the stage, and I tried to conceal myself with the group of people in front, each setting up tripods, or getting into various positions while holding cameras.
All, except me. I pulled out my phone from my pocket and tried to look like I knew what I was doing by fiddling with the settings.
I knew I looked slightly ridiculous standing there on my own, phone in hand next to people clearly more proficient.
For one wild moment, this felt like the time I’d first met Jihoon. When I’d first seen him in the lobby of Pisces, and I’d been so distracted that I’d crashed into a bollard and decked it. The level of humiliation was about on par, and in that brief second, it struck me as objectively funny. I had to wrestle the smile off my lips.
It was in that second that I caught Ace’s eye and he grinned at me before turning back to the front and shifting into a more camera ready expression.
I gamely took some shots, framing them as best as I could. I zoomed in on each member individually. Even Jihoon.
It was like he felt my attention. His eyes shifted in my direction, and like before, his gaze felt like a physical sensation, and though I was focusing on my phone screen, my eyes were locked with his through it, unable to look away.
I shivered under his penetrating stare, too scared to look up from my phone screen.
I’d gone from feeling foolish to feeling something very different. A feeling that was less easy to define. I wanted to pull it apart, to inspect it and define it, but all I could do was feel. Feel the way my body was somehow hot and cold. Feel the suddensting in my lip from where I’d bitten it without realising. Feel the way my stomach didn’t twist; it clenched.
With the barrier of the phone screen between us, we had a staring match where I felt safe enough to hold his gaze, to really look at him, when for three years, I’d avoided every image of him.
“Excuse me,” came a gruff voice to my left as someone bumped into my elbow, breaking whatever spell I’d been trapped in. The people around me were packing up their cameras, and deconstructing tripods. I hadn’t even noticed our time was up.
Instinctively I glanced back up. He was looking away. As if it hadn’t happened.
And I might have believed that, if I didn’t catch the way his hand shook before he shoved it into his pocket.
My press pass to the MCAs was limited to the red carpet barrier, and no further. While that sounded good on paper, for a smaller publication and a junior reporter it meant I was also relegated to the very end of the carpet, closer to the venue doors. Again, that sounded excellent on paper, but in reality, it was the worst place to be.
It soon became apparent to me that the big name celebrities who walked down the carpet to the Mayan Theatre tended to get out of their cars and linger at the top of the carpet, closer to where the general public were being held back by metal barriers and burly people in well-cut black suits. They then stopped further down to do interviews with the bigger, more established publications who had earned their spot in the prime locations.
Where I stood was the red carpet equivalent to the nosebleeds.
I’d managed to get the attention of one or two notable performers, but most people were just waving and smiling by the time they got close to the end.
When GVibes walked the carpet, I bottled it. I knew with the same kind of certainty of knowing your own name that had they seen me, they would have stopped. Even after sitting in a closed room with them, I just–I couldn’t do it. I’d ducked down behind the barrier, not even bothering to pretend to look for an earring or tie a shoelace. I just crouched there, red-faced, hating the way my heart thumped against my ribs.
It hadn’t been a premeditated decision. One moment I’d been watching them approach, and in the next, I’d folded in half. It was irrational, but maybe it was also self-preservation.
Through the gaps in the bars, I was able to see when they’d passed by and had gone into. Only then did I get up, push my hair back from my sweaty face and try to pretend I was okay by snagging the attention of a young rap artist.
The awards show was about to begin by the time the doors were closed, and the crowds at the barriers began to disperse. I hadn’t brought much with me, but as soon as I saw the other professionals start to pack up, I did the same.
