[PG-13] reality, rarely
Title: reality, rarely
Characters: Kyuhyun/other SM idols
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Angst, Life
Summary: It's easy to get disillusioned with celebrities. The reality rarely lives up to the fantasy.
Hi! This was something I wrote today, coming out of some sad tingling that I had after reading something. I know I've written this theme before and I hope it's not redundant but I can't get over this idea. It continues to baffle me and continues to make me wonder. Also, I don't mean to offend anyone in this. Please understand, this is fiction.
reality, rarely
Started: 9/11/11
Finished: 9/11/11
It’s easy to get disillusioned with celebrities. From afar, everyone is painted a pretty picture about who they are-always pristine in its picture-perfect glory. But sometimes, from up close, you see the cracks in the paint that make you wonder why this person is put on a pedestal for hero worship. In the smoke and mirrors world of show business, the reality rarely lives up to the fantasy.
- Metro Magazine, September 2011
When Cho Kyuhyun first steps into SM Entertainment, full of hopes and dreams and expectations of becoming a singer, with single eyelids, a case of bad hair and a little bit of fat here and there, the first thing that he’s told is, “you have to lose some weight.”
Kyuhyun shifts uncomfortably but nods in agreement. He’s always meant to do that anyway.
The coordinator then does a double take when she finally gets a good look at him. “Seems like we’ll have to do a bit of an overhaul here. What do you do, do you sing?” Kyuhyun nods. “Let’s hear it then.”
He opens his mouth, forcing a few dry notes out, and he immediately knows he’s doing badly just from the way the coordinator frowns. But he couldn’t be bothered because all he can think of is he doesn’t look anything like a singer, much less an idol, and that he should sing well at least. Pressure, pressure, pressure. It never really did any good for him.
“Never mind.” His singing is dismissed. “That’s not what’s important.”
---
What’s important was that he looked decent enough to be actually called an idol, a SM Entertainment idol more importantly. They were all beautiful people.
So aside from losing weight (note: crash diet), there were other aspects of him that needed to be fixed.
He’s told that single eyelids are never attractive, except for some people. And Rain is always, always an exception. He shouldn’t dare compare himself to him.
His hair is a mess and that it will be dealt with accordingly.
His smile is too wide and gives him a childish feel. Stop smiling so much. In fact, don’t smile at all.
Don’t hunch. It’s not attractive. Stand up straight, shoulders back. This isn’t a modeling industry, but he is an idol. Be like one.
His speaking voice should be modulated, keep it low and deep. It has potential to make fangirls drool.
His face was a problem. Pimples and pimple scars had no place in the idol industry. Never go out without make up. Or if you must, wear a cap and a mask. Pretend to be mysterious if you must. But really just hide your scarred face.
Don’t talk during interviews. Don’t say anything. The magnae never talks.
At the end of the day, Kyuhyun wonders who he is. If there will be any semblance of his self even be left. Sometimes the face that he sees in the mirror, the eyes that look back at him, he doesn’t recognize it anymore.
---
He’s walking down the hall, on the way to vocal rehearsal, (because even though it’s not important to be actually talented he still needs to be able to belt out a few proper notes,) when someone suddenly grabs his arm.
It’s BoA. BoA. He’s unexpectedly face to face with the Korean wave superstar and she’stiny and incredibly white and pretty and he doesn’t know what to say or do. He was never good with talking to people. He respectfully gives a bow.
She looks him up and down, a slight tilt to her head. “You’re new.” Before Kyuhyun could even nod, she follows up with another
question, “Who are you going to be?”
And it’s such a strange question that he really didn’t know how to answer. So he stammered instead. She answers with a condescending laugh that confused and chilled him at the same time.
---
Apparently, not even the company knew who he was going to be. Because, all of a sudden, he’s thrust into an existing idol group. They’re on the rise to fame. They have a growing fan base. They’re 12. Twelve. And Kyuhyun wonders how he could ever stand out from a group of already-popular boys and if he ever will.
“It’s not rocket science,” Ryeowook, the only member who actually talks to him, says. “You just have to be what the people need and want.” He gives the taller, but younger, male an appraising look. “Do you understand? Those are two different things.” His eyes narrow, shooting him an impatient look. “You have to speak up if you don’t understand,” he snaps.
Kyuhyun admits, more afraid than anything, that he doesn’t understand.
“Take Donghee hyung for example,” Ryeowook continues, rolling his eyes. “It’sno secret that he’s fat. I mean, how can you hide that? Being fat practically means ugly in the idol world. So he doesn’t try to be handsome, even if Super Junior is a flower boy group. The people don’t want that because it’s awkward and almost disgusting. And so he’s funny. That’s something the people need from him. To make up for all the fat.”
Kyuhyun flinches and Ryeowook gives him a small smile.
“You have a lot to learn, magnae,” he snickers.
He stares as Ryeowook beams a saccharine and irresistible smile as they walk onstage. The fans scream.
---
He finds his footing, somehow, amidst all the hate everyone is throwing his way. He’s learned how to dodge insults and not take the negative whispers to heart. But, once in a while, he stumbles and he bruises his knees. Sometimes his whole self.
“You need to stop trying so hard,” Heechul’s very irritated voice tells him through the phone. His eyes widen and he sees that Hyukjae notices, so he looks away and stares at the table. “It’s painfully obvious. Stop embarrassing the group. The three stooges are just too nice to say anything because you’re the magnae. Well, I’m not nice at all so I’m telling you. You’re embarrassing and you need to stop.”
Kyuhyun doesn’t say anything and just nods. But he doesn’t know what Heechul’s talking about. No one’s ever bothered to stop saying hurtfully honest words his way just because he was the youngest in the group. And it wasn’t like he talked a mouthful on the radio. He barely even opened his mouth.
He doesn’t speak much for the remainder of the show. There wasn’t a need to as his hyungs filled up all the airtime and gave the listeners what they wanted to hear. He sat back and just soaked everything up, giving Heechul what he wanted and needed at the moment. For him to shut up.
Later that evening, the airwaves quiet and the streets practically deserted, the van that he’s riding with the other members on their way back to the dorm spins out of control. When he’s thrown out of the spinning van and all he can hear is screaming and tires screeching, he couldn’t help but think that maybe this was what everyone wanted and needed from him. Finally, he could make them happy.
A small smile flits across his lips as he loses consciousness.
---
The moment his eyes open, the first thing he hears is a faint gasp and a voice telling him You’re stupid.
He blinks rapidly and his eyes flit about before finally resting on Ryeowook, who was hovering over him. He opens his mouth to apologize but nothing comes out, just a lot of scratchy nothingness.
“Go get the doctor, Ryeowook,” Sungmin’s voice suddenly comes into play. He orders it of the younger male and so he scampers out of the room.
Doctors and nurses fuss over him. He’s a miracle, it seems. Waking up in a coma after four days was unheard of. Most comatose patients wake up after months, even years. Some never wake up at all. And he woke up in four days. He wasn’t sure whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. He wondered what people thought.
---
“Stop thinking,” a quiet but serious voice flits through his ear. “Or if you must think, stop thinking so hard. It shows on your face.”
Kyuhyun looks at Sungmin. The older male barely says anything to him, despite being roommates and despite having all of those wine sessions with him. Because they weren’t really roommates and they had never really drunken wine together. Sungmin spends most of his time with Donghee or Hyukjae, sometimes even Yesung. He even hangs out with Siwon, and no one really likes Siwon. Just anyone but him.
“It’s advisable that you do things as if you’d just thought of doing it or saying it at the moment,”Sungmin advises impatiently. “It always, always shows if you’ve thought about it. And, I know that everything’s scripted in this world, but no one has to see it, even if they actually know it.” His hyung gives him a knowing look. “But you don’t have to think about anything before you do them. You have that privilege now. You just got into a car accident, woke up from a coma after four friggin’ days and walked out alive.”
“It’s actually been a year, almost two-.”
“It’s a brilliant idea when I think about it,” Sungmin muses, a smirk on his face. “Getting myself almost killed to be singled out never occurred to me.”
“But I didn’t-.”
“Does it matter?” Sungmin interrupts. And there was a tone in his voice that screamed resentment and desperation. It made Kyuhyun shut up. “You came out of a coma period. It doesn’t matter what you do. People would just smile and let you have your way. You’re invincible now. Untouchable.”
---
He sees the awkward member of Super Junior M, another one of the company’s gimmick groups so that they could enter the Chinese market (Apparently, they’re good enough to branch out now), in the hallway on the second floor on a Thursday afternoon.
The male is crouched down on the floor, outside the practice room, scribbling down heavily and studiously on a tattered red notebook. He has half a mind to walk away, but curiosity gets the better of him so he stops and looks down at him.
“What are you doing?” Kyuhyun demands.
The other male’s eyes widen as he sees who talked to him then gives him a wary smile. “I’m Zhou Mi,” he introduces himself, his smile widening bit by bit.
“I know who you are and that’s not what I asked,” Kyuhyun retorts, knowing fully well why he introduced himself. No one’s
really acknowledged him yet. He nods towards his notebook. “What are you doing?”
Zhou Mi stammers so much that it eats up all of Kyuhyun’s patience. He bends down and grabs the notebook from his grasp.
As he reads, his eyes slightly widen and he remembers when it was him who wrote down everything that was wrong with what he looked like and everything about himself.
He lowers the notebook down and returns it to him. “What do you think this all means, all these things that you’ve written down?”
Zhou Mi’s wide eyes, glistening with tears, flutter from Kyuhyun to the words on his notebook then back up again. And Kyuhyun knows what is going through his head. All that rejection from the fans, from everyone around him, it was painful and heartbreaking and a wake-up call. The company wasn’t happy with him.
“Perfection. They-they want me to be perfect,” Zhou Mi whispers.
Kyuhyun just looks at him for a while and wonders how this has never occurred to him as quickly as this man had gotten it. But he shoots him a blasé look and shrugs.
“Good,” Kyuhyun tells him. “Now go and be perfect.”
“If I lose any more weight, if I change more of myself, I’ll disappear,” Zhou Mi whispers.
And Kyuhyun wonders when he’s lost that grappling fear of losing himself that was so evident in Zhou Mi’s eyes.
Characters: Kyuhyun/other SM idols
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Angst, Life
Summary: It's easy to get disillusioned with celebrities. The reality rarely lives up to the fantasy.
Hi! This was something I wrote today, coming out of some sad tingling that I had after reading something. I know I've written this theme before and I hope it's not redundant but I can't get over this idea. It continues to baffle me and continues to make me wonder. Also, I don't mean to offend anyone in this. Please understand, this is fiction.
reality, rarely
Started: 9/11/11
Finished: 9/11/11
It’s easy to get disillusioned with celebrities. From afar, everyone is painted a pretty picture about who they are-always pristine in its picture-perfect glory. But sometimes, from up close, you see the cracks in the paint that make you wonder why this person is put on a pedestal for hero worship. In the smoke and mirrors world of show business, the reality rarely lives up to the fantasy.
- Metro Magazine, September 2011
When Cho Kyuhyun first steps into SM Entertainment, full of hopes and dreams and expectations of becoming a singer, with single eyelids, a case of bad hair and a little bit of fat here and there, the first thing that he’s told is, “you have to lose some weight.”
Kyuhyun shifts uncomfortably but nods in agreement. He’s always meant to do that anyway.
The coordinator then does a double take when she finally gets a good look at him. “Seems like we’ll have to do a bit of an overhaul here. What do you do, do you sing?” Kyuhyun nods. “Let’s hear it then.”
He opens his mouth, forcing a few dry notes out, and he immediately knows he’s doing badly just from the way the coordinator frowns. But he couldn’t be bothered because all he can think of is he doesn’t look anything like a singer, much less an idol, and that he should sing well at least. Pressure, pressure, pressure. It never really did any good for him.
“Never mind.” His singing is dismissed. “That’s not what’s important.”
---
What’s important was that he looked decent enough to be actually called an idol, a SM Entertainment idol more importantly. They were all beautiful people.
So aside from losing weight (note: crash diet), there were other aspects of him that needed to be fixed.
He’s told that single eyelids are never attractive, except for some people. And Rain is always, always an exception. He shouldn’t dare compare himself to him.
His hair is a mess and that it will be dealt with accordingly.
His smile is too wide and gives him a childish feel. Stop smiling so much. In fact, don’t smile at all.
Don’t hunch. It’s not attractive. Stand up straight, shoulders back. This isn’t a modeling industry, but he is an idol. Be like one.
His speaking voice should be modulated, keep it low and deep. It has potential to make fangirls drool.
His face was a problem. Pimples and pimple scars had no place in the idol industry. Never go out without make up. Or if you must, wear a cap and a mask. Pretend to be mysterious if you must. But really just hide your scarred face.
Don’t talk during interviews. Don’t say anything. The magnae never talks.
At the end of the day, Kyuhyun wonders who he is. If there will be any semblance of his self even be left. Sometimes the face that he sees in the mirror, the eyes that look back at him, he doesn’t recognize it anymore.
---
He’s walking down the hall, on the way to vocal rehearsal, (because even though it’s not important to be actually talented he still needs to be able to belt out a few proper notes,) when someone suddenly grabs his arm.
It’s BoA. BoA. He’s unexpectedly face to face with the Korean wave superstar and she’stiny and incredibly white and pretty and he doesn’t know what to say or do. He was never good with talking to people. He respectfully gives a bow.
She looks him up and down, a slight tilt to her head. “You’re new.” Before Kyuhyun could even nod, she follows up with another
question, “Who are you going to be?”
And it’s such a strange question that he really didn’t know how to answer. So he stammered instead. She answers with a condescending laugh that confused and chilled him at the same time.
---
Apparently, not even the company knew who he was going to be. Because, all of a sudden, he’s thrust into an existing idol group. They’re on the rise to fame. They have a growing fan base. They’re 12. Twelve. And Kyuhyun wonders how he could ever stand out from a group of already-popular boys and if he ever will.
“It’s not rocket science,” Ryeowook, the only member who actually talks to him, says. “You just have to be what the people need and want.” He gives the taller, but younger, male an appraising look. “Do you understand? Those are two different things.” His eyes narrow, shooting him an impatient look. “You have to speak up if you don’t understand,” he snaps.
Kyuhyun admits, more afraid than anything, that he doesn’t understand.
“Take Donghee hyung for example,” Ryeowook continues, rolling his eyes. “It’sno secret that he’s fat. I mean, how can you hide that? Being fat practically means ugly in the idol world. So he doesn’t try to be handsome, even if Super Junior is a flower boy group. The people don’t want that because it’s awkward and almost disgusting. And so he’s funny. That’s something the people need from him. To make up for all the fat.”
Kyuhyun flinches and Ryeowook gives him a small smile.
“You have a lot to learn, magnae,” he snickers.
He stares as Ryeowook beams a saccharine and irresistible smile as they walk onstage. The fans scream.
---
He finds his footing, somehow, amidst all the hate everyone is throwing his way. He’s learned how to dodge insults and not take the negative whispers to heart. But, once in a while, he stumbles and he bruises his knees. Sometimes his whole self.
“You need to stop trying so hard,” Heechul’s very irritated voice tells him through the phone. His eyes widen and he sees that Hyukjae notices, so he looks away and stares at the table. “It’s painfully obvious. Stop embarrassing the group. The three stooges are just too nice to say anything because you’re the magnae. Well, I’m not nice at all so I’m telling you. You’re embarrassing and you need to stop.”
Kyuhyun doesn’t say anything and just nods. But he doesn’t know what Heechul’s talking about. No one’s ever bothered to stop saying hurtfully honest words his way just because he was the youngest in the group. And it wasn’t like he talked a mouthful on the radio. He barely even opened his mouth.
He doesn’t speak much for the remainder of the show. There wasn’t a need to as his hyungs filled up all the airtime and gave the listeners what they wanted to hear. He sat back and just soaked everything up, giving Heechul what he wanted and needed at the moment. For him to shut up.
Later that evening, the airwaves quiet and the streets practically deserted, the van that he’s riding with the other members on their way back to the dorm spins out of control. When he’s thrown out of the spinning van and all he can hear is screaming and tires screeching, he couldn’t help but think that maybe this was what everyone wanted and needed from him. Finally, he could make them happy.
A small smile flits across his lips as he loses consciousness.
---
The moment his eyes open, the first thing he hears is a faint gasp and a voice telling him You’re stupid.
He blinks rapidly and his eyes flit about before finally resting on Ryeowook, who was hovering over him. He opens his mouth to apologize but nothing comes out, just a lot of scratchy nothingness.
“Go get the doctor, Ryeowook,” Sungmin’s voice suddenly comes into play. He orders it of the younger male and so he scampers out of the room.
Doctors and nurses fuss over him. He’s a miracle, it seems. Waking up in a coma after four days was unheard of. Most comatose patients wake up after months, even years. Some never wake up at all. And he woke up in four days. He wasn’t sure whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. He wondered what people thought.
---
“Stop thinking,” a quiet but serious voice flits through his ear. “Or if you must think, stop thinking so hard. It shows on your face.”
Kyuhyun looks at Sungmin. The older male barely says anything to him, despite being roommates and despite having all of those wine sessions with him. Because they weren’t really roommates and they had never really drunken wine together. Sungmin spends most of his time with Donghee or Hyukjae, sometimes even Yesung. He even hangs out with Siwon, and no one really likes Siwon. Just anyone but him.
“It’s advisable that you do things as if you’d just thought of doing it or saying it at the moment,”Sungmin advises impatiently. “It always, always shows if you’ve thought about it. And, I know that everything’s scripted in this world, but no one has to see it, even if they actually know it.” His hyung gives him a knowing look. “But you don’t have to think about anything before you do them. You have that privilege now. You just got into a car accident, woke up from a coma after four friggin’ days and walked out alive.”
“It’s actually been a year, almost two-.”
“It’s a brilliant idea when I think about it,” Sungmin muses, a smirk on his face. “Getting myself almost killed to be singled out never occurred to me.”
“But I didn’t-.”
“Does it matter?” Sungmin interrupts. And there was a tone in his voice that screamed resentment and desperation. It made Kyuhyun shut up. “You came out of a coma period. It doesn’t matter what you do. People would just smile and let you have your way. You’re invincible now. Untouchable.”
---
He sees the awkward member of Super Junior M, another one of the company’s gimmick groups so that they could enter the Chinese market (Apparently, they’re good enough to branch out now), in the hallway on the second floor on a Thursday afternoon.
The male is crouched down on the floor, outside the practice room, scribbling down heavily and studiously on a tattered red notebook. He has half a mind to walk away, but curiosity gets the better of him so he stops and looks down at him.
“What are you doing?” Kyuhyun demands.
The other male’s eyes widen as he sees who talked to him then gives him a wary smile. “I’m Zhou Mi,” he introduces himself, his smile widening bit by bit.
“I know who you are and that’s not what I asked,” Kyuhyun retorts, knowing fully well why he introduced himself. No one’s
really acknowledged him yet. He nods towards his notebook. “What are you doing?”
Zhou Mi stammers so much that it eats up all of Kyuhyun’s patience. He bends down and grabs the notebook from his grasp.
As he reads, his eyes slightly widen and he remembers when it was him who wrote down everything that was wrong with what he looked like and everything about himself.
He lowers the notebook down and returns it to him. “What do you think this all means, all these things that you’ve written down?”
Zhou Mi’s wide eyes, glistening with tears, flutter from Kyuhyun to the words on his notebook then back up again. And Kyuhyun knows what is going through his head. All that rejection from the fans, from everyone around him, it was painful and heartbreaking and a wake-up call. The company wasn’t happy with him.
“Perfection. They-they want me to be perfect,” Zhou Mi whispers.
Kyuhyun just looks at him for a while and wonders how this has never occurred to him as quickly as this man had gotten it. But he shoots him a blasé look and shrugs.
“Good,” Kyuhyun tells him. “Now go and be perfect.”
“If I lose any more weight, if I change more of myself, I’ll disappear,” Zhou Mi whispers.
And Kyuhyun wonders when he’s lost that grappling fear of losing himself that was so evident in Zhou Mi’s eyes.