falling stars + fake smiles; chapter 8
It was pretty late now. Well... pretty late for an idol who had an empty schedule for the next 48 hours. It was almost midnight and all the Super Junior members had scurried back to their dorms and bedroom for, what the manager had told them, sleep. But in reality, without the eagle eye of their sensible, mature Manager hyung, the members rarely felt like going to sleep once in their rooms. They'd stay up just talking loudly or playing games until slowly, one by one, they'd drop off.
It was now almost 1am, and the noise of clattering in the room on the 12th floor had quietened up at this point. The lights were all out except for Kyuhyun’s room, from his silent laptop. His hand cupped around the small, wireless mouse on the table, a click here and a click there as Kyuhyun’s eyes bored the messages written to him on the screen through his black framed glasses.
He had opened his laptop immediately after going into his room. After watching Star King, he decided to not go out again. Instead, since he had some free time and wasn’t feeling particularly tired, he thought answering some fan mail would be a good use to time. He ended up discovering more mail than he thought, so while the others were having dinner in front of the TV while watching a drama (that Kyuhyun was planning to watch online anyway, so he wasn’t missing anything), he snuck into the bathroom for himself. He was glad the shower was cold when it hit him, he usually hated it, like normal people would. It was freezing cold outside and the forecaster said there was a chance it would snow that night, but Kyuhyun was glad nonetheless. His slowly dimming mind was abruptly awakened and refreshed again.
Kyuhyun went back to his room after washing up and closed the door. Having pulled out his contact lenses, he sat down at his desk and put on the glasses on the table. Once adjusted, he nonchalantly went back to the mail.
Even when Sungmin came in a few hours later to go to bed, Kyuhyun didn’t feel tired. Right now, Sungmin was in his bed behind him, clutching a pillow and fast asleep. He had requested that Kyuhyun turn off his desk lamp, and he complied.
It was sure dark right now. He wasn’t sure why he was still awake anymore at this point, but still, he clicked the next message.
Kyuhyun oppa! I love you and Donghae oppa so much! Please reply to me~!
Kyuhyun chuckled lightly to himself and pushed up his glasses on the bridge of his nose. He then typed in a reply.
Only if you love me more than Donghae. Don’t love Donghae.
Each message he answered, a little bit of relief flowed through his body, washing out that horrible block of depression still stuck to the back of his mind from the stress of that day.
Feeling slightly helpless, he had even gathered his courage and peeked over at the official message board of Star King to see if anyone had actually caught on about the real deal of Seungyeon hurting herself, but he refrained from going too far. He still had that ol’ fear of reading negative comments about himself or his colleagues. Kyuhyun had scrolled halfway down the page when he would realize that it was a bad idea, no matter how curious he was.
The song that played on his computer suddenly jumped to a loud rock song that echoed through his headphones, jolting Kyuhyun in his seat. Blinking twice to bring himself out of his thoughts again, he realized that he had stopped midsentence of the next reply, and in those mindless seconds, a few dozen more messages had popped up. They seemed to be clustering due to the fact that the fans knew he was online at this point.
Kyuhyun sighed and turned off the music, pulling off his headphones. He didn’t want to answer anymore. The aching in his shoulder scrapped onto his muscle as Kyuhyun stretched, having sat rigidly for the last few hours. He glanced behind him at the sound of Sungmin shuffling in his bed. Even from the limited amount of light, the older Super Junior member looked peaceful as opposed to heavily exhausted a few days earlier. The pillow he hugged slipped from his arms onto the floor, and Sungmin made soft sounds of discomfort while sleepily feeling around for it. Kyuhyun smiled to himself and pulled the pillow back onto the bed. Once he found it, Sungmin embraced it and turned to lay on his back, falling back to easy sleep.
Heaving another sigh, Kyuhyun closed the window with his unfinished message with one hand and rubbed his eye with the other, emitting a yawn. He checked the time; it was well into the night now, and even though the schedule was once again empty for another thankful day, he did want to spend it with his members instead of wasting away by sleeping.
Kyuhyun yawned again and proceeded to log off the game account as well, standing up from his seat as he closed the final window and all set to shut down for the night. However, this still wasn’t the case, and if Kyuhyun didn’t need anything else to hold him back from going to bed, he apparently had left his messenger on as well, and a few of his friends had been messaging him through the hour without his knowledge. He let out a frustrated sigh and sat back down.
Most of the friends were already offline, so there was no point replying right now. The ones that were online were “AWAY” and simply weren’t there to reply to Kyuhyun’s reply. He hated that; he needed to remind himself to switch off the automatic login from now on, it was a bother when he was gaming. He closed all the windows again and moved his mouse to the exit button on the messenger.
But then something caught his eye.
hamster5: Online
Seungyeon was online? At this time of night?
Kyuhyun lowered his head down to the monitor and squinted his eyes to make sure, all in the while his mind came up with ridiculous reasons about whether or not her account had been hacked and it wasn’t Seungyeon who was online at all. She injured her arm, she would be better off resting than surfing right, right?
He frowned through his frames and threw one more glance at the time, feeling uneasy again. cautiously, he positioned his fingers on the keyboard.
Should he really need to be considering this? Was it sort of none of his business to why she was still awake?
On the other hand, it could just be that she left her laptop on while she was asleep.
But then it would read that she was away from the keyboard instead of Online.
kyu008: hi
Kyuhyun immediately dropped his face into his hands and exhaled deeply, cringing at the fact he had just sent a message. It wasn’t because it was a message, it wasn’t because he had never spoken to her online before (which he had), it was because of a feeling of curiousness that gnawed at the back of his brain that Kyuhyun didn’t understand. And it annoyed him.
Waiting for a reply, if it were ever coming, that gnawing sensation quickly transpired into awkward embarrassment at the thought of Seungyeon sound asleep in bed, and waking up to find a message of “Hi” from him. Was he worrying too much about nothing? Why was he worried in the first place anyway?
Maybe he just needed to get some sleep.
Jingle, jingle.
hamster5: hello, kyuhyun?
Kyuhyun started typing again in an instant.
kyu088: hello
kyu008: can't sleep?
hamster5: yeah, I’m just bored right now T_T
kyu008: is your arm okay?
hamster5: it doesn't hurt anymore
A part of Kyuhyun didn’t seem to believe her.
kyu088: did you go to the hospital after your gig?
hamster5: yes I did
hamster5: my manager told me to
hamster5: are you really kyuhyun, or are you manager oppa pretending to be him?
hamster5: kekekeke~
kyu088: so what was it?
hamster5: the doctor said I pulled a muscle and a blister on my hand broke
Kyuhyun watched the status box that showed that Seungyeon was writing a long message, stopped and then typed something again before sending it.
hamster5: but it’s all better now
kyu088: are you sure?
kyu008: if your hand isn’t alright, you shouldn’t type
hamster5: they’re just blisters
hamster5: you underestimate me too much
hamster5: do you want to talk over the phone instead?
hamster5: I could call your phone right now and we could just talk =D
hamster5: we could talk until the sun comes up
Even though this was an internet conversation, Kyuhyun was able to detect her sarcasm quite easily. Being in the entertainment business for a while now, there was nothing more dangerous than to be caught up in a scandal involving late night phone calls between idols. Kyuhyun had known from Eeteuk and Kangin’s experiences of having their phones hacked.
kyu088: alright, I get your point
kyu088: why are you up at this time anyway?
hamster5: I’ve been catching up on television shows online
hamster5: why are you awake?
kyu088: I was answering fanmail
hamster5: you weren’t playing starcraft?
kyu088: I was doing that too
hamster5: did you finish that mission we did last time?
kyu088: that was ages ago!
kyu088: and I was wondering why you haven’t been online lately
kyu088: even gyuri’s still playing
hamster5: I’ve been working
hamster5: I’m rehearsing for a musical
hamster5: really excited for it
kyu088: really?
hamster5: yeah =]
hamster5: and I’m into this new game called age of conan
hamster5: my friend from america recommended it to me
kyu088: age of conan... I’ve heard of that
hamster5: it’s really fun to play ^^
hamster5: it’s set in a fantasy world where an evil warlock conan the barbarian has taken over the land
hamtser5: do you want to try?
hamster5: but it’s not in korean yet
kyu088: TT TT
hamster5: what’s wrong?
kyu088: nothing
kyu088: it’s just that super junior members all play starcraft these days
hamster5: all of them?
hamster5: give me their usernames
kyu088: why?
hamster5: because I want to play with them
hamster5: and they’re super junior
kyu088: I am also super junior
hamster5: kekekeke~
hamster5: but I don’t make friends easily and I am a super junior fan
kyu088: who’s your favourite member?
Kyuhyun released the mouse and rested his cheek against his fist as he patiently waiting for her to answer. It was interesting watching the status bar, she typed, then stopped, then typed, then stopped to rethink her choice. He bit into his bottom lip as an amused smile curved up the corner of his mouth when she still hadn’t answered. His fingers tapped at the keyboard again.
kyu088: it’s okay if it isn’t me
hamster5: I know
hamster5: it’s just hard to choose
Kyuhyun couldn’t help but laugh at this comment.
kyu088: so it really isn’t me?
kyu088: I’m not your favourite member?
hamster5: the truth is... I never really paid attention to you
kyu088: not even once?
kyu088: be honest
hamster5: I might have thought you were cute during don’t don
kyu088: really?
kyu088: I wasn’t supposed to be cute
kyu088: I was supposed to look tough
kyu088: then who did you look at?
hamster5: It’s a secret~
He accidentally allowed himself laugh out loud at Seungyeon's honest comment, so loudly that Sungmin stirred. Kyuhyun sealed the laugh inside his lips and typed another reply. His fingers tapped the keys vigorously, a sense of competition suddenly overtaking his veins.
kyu088: just give me a hint
hamster5: no really, I can't decide
kyu088: what’s your blood type?
kyu088: I can see which member most suits you
hamster5: ever since super junior debuted, I’ve had passing crushes on many of you
hamster5: I think about 7
kyu088: 7??
kyu088: yet I’m not one of them?
hamster5: no XD
kyu088: truthfully?
hamster5: will saying yes make you feel better?
kyu088: hahahaha
kyu088: no I am glad you’re honest
hamster5: I’m blood type A
kyu088: hmmm
kyu088: eeteuk, sungmin, donghae, and kibum are type A
kyu088: are any of them your favourite?
The status bar stalled again.
kyu088: I am also type A, if you’re interested to know
hamster5: hahahaha!!
hamster5: it’s still a secret
They did have some fun badgering on about this argument for a while, mainly because Kyuhyun wanted her to just admit she didn’t have a favourite at the moment, “accusing” her of favouring some other boyband. Seungyeon didn’t seem to budge at all either, which was unexpected since he would have thought she’d bombard him with questions about girl groups. Perhaps she was saving that for a real showdown.
The tenth time she typed “It’s a secret”, Kyuhyun felt the urge to physically leap through the computer portal and wrestle with the letters. She just wouldn’t tell him!
However, he did notice that her typing eventually became slower, and the happy feeling he had faded into silent concern when he remembered that her injury wouldn’t have healed completely in just a few days like that.
kyu008: do you have a schedule tomorrow?
hamster5: yes
hamster5: eeteuk oppa and eunhyuk oppa’s radio show again with hara
kyu088: you should go to sleep then
hamster5: it’s not until tomorrow night
kyu088: it’s really late now anyway
hamster5: but i’m not tired
kyu088: then do you want to argue some more until you tell me who is your favourite?
hamster5: ...alright, fine
hamster5: i’ll go to bed T-T
hamster5: you should too
kyu088: I will
hamster5: goodnight
kyu088: we’ll discuss more on this later
hamster5: kekekeke, alright
kyu088: sleep well~
hamster5: sleep well~
With another jingle, Kyuhyun watched as “hamster5” logged off.
He suddenly felt empty now, despite having fun chatting to Seungyeon. There was no way her arm would have healed so quickly even if it was only a pulled muscle, it must still be reasonably painful. Kyuhyun pulled off his glasses and dropped onto his bed as his roommate tossed and turned again. He stared up at the ceiling.
Hmmm... when was the next time he’d see Kara again? Their schedules clashed very often these days, because he had a solo contribution and was promoting the song on music shows. Seungyeon and Gyuri, although not promoting as Kara, were temporary hosts for Music Bank with SHINee’s Jonghyun for the next few weeks, so even if Kyuhyun wasn’t able to catch up with Kara overall, he would still see Gyuri and Seungyeon at least once a week.
Music Bank was just a few days away now. Kyuhyun wondered how Seungyeon would be able to hide her injury on live television as the host. He wondered if by then, her arm would be in better shape than it was on Star King. But a pulled muscle really depended on how bad it was in order to heal, and he didn’t even know how bad it was.
Lying down with a soft pillow under his head, Kyuhyun began to feel the time finally catch up to him. Too tired to even yawn as the fatigue filled his body, his eyelids fluttered lightly a few times, and slowly, very slowly, the last member of Super Junior fell asleep.