“I’ve been playing with the same idea.” Alex sounds excited and he’s never overtly excited—he’s too much the smooth PR guy. “I was going to ask you for advice. The trip you planned when Ben and I went to Greece was incredible.”
This makes me laugh, partly with relief and partly with excitement.
“I already have something,” I say. I’d taken the notes from the other night and turned them into a proposal.
“Send it to me. I’ll read it now.”
Alex spends the rest of lunch shifting between his food and making suggestions on my proposal. Once we’re happy, we pause.
“Will Yesterly and Havings be okay with you doing this?” he asks, nibbling on some bean sprouts.
I shrug. “Gotta live while you can.”
He shoots me an astounded look. “Who are you? Ari would never say such a thing.”
I ignore that. “I’ll send it to Ines later. I think she’ll like it.”
We finish eating, and after Alex heads to the airport, I sit on my bed. It’s with unfamiliar delight and no small degree of stress that I switch on my out-of-office email notifications.
I’m officially on vacation, so I pull my proposal up on my laptop to read it over one more time. Alex’s suggestions were solid, and I can visualize how the tour would work. I know it would do well.
Then I send it. Like that, one click and it’s gone. Looking at my cursor on the screen, I wonder why there are no undercurrents ofshouldorwhat about. Instead my mind ticks over more ideas in a satisfied, steady rhythm.
That Yesterly and Havings is not front and center is disconcerting because it’s been one of my only concerns for my entire professional life. What I can do to impress Richard. How to get more work. How to win. It was all I thought I wanted, but work was a thing I did, not a thing I was deeply connected to. It was transactional.
Now something’s shifted, and I don’t know who I am anymore. We’d done a Who Is Jihoon Day in Toronto. Now I wish I’d done that Who Is Ari Day as well.
It would have been useful.
Thirty-Five
Hana arrives later in the afternoon. Jihoon asked Yeong to collect her from the airport, and after they pick me up from the hotel, we head to Jihoon’s apartment. It’s near Itaewon in a neighborhood called Hannam-dong, close to most of the places we want to see over the next couple days. We’re both dozing when my phone dings with some photos from Jihoon. The first is the whole band dressed as princes in lush velvet and brocade and tight pants laced at the front with high boots, standing in what looks like a baroque fairy-tale throne room in outer space.
The second is of him and Kit, back-to-back and looking at the sky. The last is of him, alone, standing near a rock with a light saber, King Arthur style. He’s looking straight at the camera with his tongue touching his lip, dangling a crown from his hand. I make an ungodly noise, and Hana is instantly awake.
“Is that Kit?” Her eyes bug out as she looks at the second photo. Then she blinks. “Hoonie sent you their concept photos? Unedited?”
“I guess. He said they had a shoot today.”
“Do you have any idea how secret these are? StarLune’s concepts might as well be stored in Fort Knox. If these get leaked, there will be chaos in the fandom.”
“I’m not going to leak them,” I protest. I can’t stop looking at thephotos. He’s not even a person right now, and it’s clear why they’re called idols. This is Min, not Jihoon. The uncertainty stirs in my chest again but is immediately quelled by knowing he trusted me enough to send the shots.
Hana scrolls through the photos. “Starrys are going to go nuts with how hot these are. It makes sense with the hints Newlight’s been dropping about the new album.”
I make a face and content myself with sending a series of fire emojis to Jihoon.
“You don’t know anything about what they’re planning, do you?”
“We don’t talk about that a lot.” We texted frequently but haven’t been able to meet again thanks to his punishing schedule.
She glares at me. “Pretending he isn’t who he is isn’t helpful.”
It takes me a minute to parse this out, but when I do, I decide to ignore it. “I was busy. This was a work trip.”
“You were busy ignoring the fact that you are dating Jihoon and Jihoon is a vocalist for StarLune.”
“We’re notdating.” Not if dating includes actual dates.
