CH 29

After the meeting with Kim Hee Sang, Ian headed to a nearby café right away.

It was because of a meeting with the production crew of the one-act drama ‘I Want to Hear Your Sound’.

“Hello.”

Ian greeted the cafe staff with a smile. The staff swallowed a breath with a gasp.

He headed to a conference room separated by glass. The camera was already set inside.

Ian entered the conference room and bowed down to greet.

“Hello! Am I late, perhaps?”

There were already the PD and a person who appeared to be the writer sitting in the chairs. Ian glanced at the clock. He came 5 minutes earlier than the appointment time.

“That’s not it. We arrived early. Nice to meet you.”

“Please sit down.”

Ian sat across from them.

[Was he skinny at this time?]

Jin circled the man. The man is the director of this one-act drama, Choi Jong Min. In the future, he will move to a cable TV station and produce numerous hits.

The woman is writer Park Joo Yeon. The writer will also follow Choi Jong Min to the cable TV station. The two were future drama masters, which will be called ‘the golden duo’.

“You’re much more handsome in person.”

Writer Park Joo Yeon stared blankly at Ian’s face. Ian touched his back hair while saying thanks.

“I really enjoyed reading the script sent to me. In particular, I was impressed by the last part when Seong Min broke other people’s gaze.”

“Is that so?”

Park Joo Yeon smiled faintly. Seong Min is the name of the role Ian will play.

“That is why I am practicing oral language1 more intensively than sign language.”

‘I Want to Hear Your Sound’ or IWHYS is the story of Seong Min, who has lived as a deaf person.

It depicts the process of Seong Min, who has closed his heart due to numerous discrimination and ridicule, when he meets Yu Ra, an always ambitious returning student, and confirms each other’s hearts as he becomes increasingly influenced by her.

Being deaf does not necessarily mean that they can’t hear completely nor use sign language unconditionally.

Some people learn lip-reading and oral language according to their efforts, and Seong Min in the play is an oral speaker.

Seong Min grew up ‘watching’ the social prejudice as a disabled and was ridiculed for his poor pronunciation. Later, he shuts his mouth in frustration that his efforts have been denied.

And in the ending part, Seong Min is influenced by Yu Ra, so he doesn’t dwell on the gaze of others anymore and breaks his shell. At this point, he opens his mouth again.

So, the title of this one-act drama was like Yu Ra’s heart to Seong Min, not Seong Min’s to Yu Ra.

“Is that so? Can you show it to us?”

Therefore, the lines at the end were very important. Director Choi Jong Min uncrossed his arms and rested his chin on one hand.

Ian cleared his throat and briefly recited the lines in the play. Director Choi and Writer Park let out an ‘oh’, amazed by it.

“You still need to refine it more, right?”

“No, it is perfect by my standards. What about you, Writer Park?”

“It is fine. Did you learn sign language too, perhaps?”

Seong Min in the early part of the play uses sign language and writing. When Ian expressed the same lines in sign language, Writer Park nodded with a satisfied look.

Ian smiled as he relaxed. It was worth learning while reducing sleep.

[I remembered. The writer’s older sister was deaf.]

‘I see.’

That’s why the director seemed to care a lot about the writer’s feedback somehow.

“It is more than I expected.”

“Thank you.”

“You must have done a lot of research, right?”

Ian thanked this era when MyTube became popular and honestly expressed his personal opinion by gently sprinkling seasoning.

A deep smile spread across the lips of the writer and director.

“Good. We will let you know the schedule through the agency.”

“Yep.”

Director Choi sent Ian first in consideration of him who couldn’t spend a lot of time.

Ian met Park Dong Soo, who came back after taking the rest of the members, and headed to the dorm.

“Wow…”

As Ian left, the silence that filled the conference room for a moment was full of everyone’s admiration.

The staff who came to set the camera told the director.

“Wow, my eyes got dazzled. I’ve never seen such a handsome person before.”

“I, who was right facing him, felt my heart was about to stop. The same man.”

“Isn’t he also good at talking? Does the agency teach that kind of thing these days?”

Idols these days also get character education by their agency. However, the director thought Ian had answered sincerely. His eyes were serious, and above all, his face provoked persuasion.

“Did I make any mistakes?”

Writer Park Joo Yeon, who was just absent-minded no matter what Ian said, blushed.

“No. Writer Park was completely professional.”

The staff gave a thumbs up.

Director Choi was a fan of ‘Black Out’ starring Ian.

When Ian first appeared as a delivery boy, he thought he was just a consumable minor role to draw attention with his face. However, Ian is much better at acting than he thought.

Since then, he wanted to use Ian in any of his work and the opportunity came quickly.

The writer, who didn’t know Ian well, said that Ian’s handsomeness was likely to stand out too much in the play and wouldn’t it be better to use an aspiring actor who need opportunities or an experienced actor than an idol.

The director thought the writer’s words made sense, so he even put another actor in the final casting.

However, out of all things, the actor called the ‘non-disabled person’ a ‘normal person’ at the meeting.2

He wouldn’t have done such a senseless thing if he did a few searches, but it showed that he had no brain and didn’t research the data properly.

The writer was extremely angry because of that, and of course, the casting of that actor was canceled. The director recommended Ian after hesitating.

“How about releasing it in advance as a pre-release?”

The director told the writer while watching the staff retrieving the camera. It was the video that will be uploaded to My Tube as a behind-the-scenes video.

“I think the video will come out well, and seeing his oral, it wasn’t ridiculous and seriously did it well.”

“I think it will be okay.”

Inwardly, the director wanted to attract attention with Ian’s face and also draw viewership.

And the director’s intention played a big role in eroding the controversy that would arise later.

***

After the meeting, Ian arrived at the agency’s meeting room. Other members were already lying down on chairs and hanging their arms.

Post-it-sized notes were piled up on the desk in the conference room. A polaroid camera and films were neatly placed on another side.

“Did you all write a lot?”

Ian took off his jacket and sat in an empty seat. Jo Tae Woong raised his hand silently and sobbed. Didn’t write a lot, huh.

“Did the meeting go well?”

“Yeah, how many sheets should I write?”

“As much as possible.”

Lee Joo Hyuk, sitting across from him, let out some gibberish words.

“It’s hard to write everything differently.”

Ian grabbed a felt-tip pen and sticky notes to his front.

In the ‘Idol Olympics’, which will be recorded in a few days, seats are filled with fans of each singer.

Popular idols took about 150 seats, and Awy’s fan seats were 80 seats. It was lavish compared to 30 seats during Kim Yong Min’s time.

“What should I write? Hey, Jo Tae Woong. What did you write?

“Humph, no cheating.”

Fans have to wait from 6 am and have to stay there all day until 11 pm when the recording ends.

But then, does the broadcasting company take care of the meals for so many fans? No. The singer has to pay for the fans’ meals as well, but this ‘reverse tribute’ has become a custom.

The station acted as patronizing as much as the puny appearance fee is given, but that doesn’t mean they give a lot of screen time. In some cases, it took 3 seconds at most.

However, if you don’t appear, there will be disadvantages as the PD for iLympic is also in charge of the music show PD.

The lunch box and snacks for reverse tribute had to be prepared by paying attention to the quality. If prepared poorly, it becomes a laughing stock for other fandoms.

The appearance is like a deficit from the agency’s point of view. My stomach hurts thinking this will also be cut from the settlement later. Ian filled up the note papers.

“Woah, when will you finish if you write that long?”

“Write the sticker to put on the snack first. It’s small, so it’ll be over quickly.”

Park Jin Hyuk handed out a label sticker. Ian put the phrase ‘사랑한다’3 first and looked at it.

Awy writes different phrases for each snack and lunch box to give to the fans.

Those are gifts to prevent fans from leaving in the middle, including signed polaroids they had to take a lot of.

[Anyway you’re iLympic’s veteran, so the writing keeps coming out huh?]

‘Here’s another story that can’t be heard without tears.’

Ian laughed self-mockingly. Sitting next to him, Jo Tae Woong looked at him with a ‘What’s wrong with him?’ gaze.

‘Diamond’s fans seats were only 30 seats, you know? It was the beginning of our debut, so the members were so motivated and prepared snacks by hand… We also write these things a lot.’

[Wow, 30 people. Respect.]

‘But when we looked at our fans’ seats after a few hours, more than half of the fans disappeared.’

[Why?]

‘They’re not our fans.’

Ian quickly filled the notes and turned his wrist gently. Lee Joo Hyuk admired Ian’s explosive speed.

‘It turned out that Jupiter’s fandom couldn’t find their seats, so they came into the fan seats of other Mangdols’

[Heol. Lost faith in humanity.]

‘So they took all the meals and went to the fan seat on the other side to see their bias.’

Jupiter was the group that Ian, unfortunately, eliminated from after being slapped in the head by that nephew. So ironic. Feeling bitter for nothing, Ian took a sip of water.

‘Since then, we’ve been traumatized, so we just prepared roughly for the iLympic.’

[Did another fandom crawl in even after that? Didn’t tell them off?]

‘We didn’t. When my fans said something, they got even angrier? How many Jupiter fans were there? Well-off fans are guiltless, and badly-off fans are guilty4.’

Ian remembered the forgotten dream-like memories when Awy confirmed their appearance in iLympic. He didn’t want to go through that nightmare again.

“I think I’ll have to write whenever there’s time between schedules. It’s killing me to do it all at once.”

“It’ll be better to take Polaroid photos one by one. It looks insincere if you take a lot of photos with similar styling.”

Of course, those were jokes since they’re about to be dragged again for Chuseok iLympic. There’s no way Awy won’t go out when even top-tier idols are also being dragged in.

“But then, it’ll be nice if we get more than 100 seats next time.”

When Ian spoke blankly, the other members shouted ‘of course’ here and there. Ian laughed.

“But if it’s 80 seats for the first time, it’s a lot, right?”

“I think so? I heard that the teams that debuted around the same time received around 30 to 50 seats.”

“I guess our fandom has gotten bigger.”

Kim Ju Young was grumpy at Jo Tae Woong’s ensuing words.

“We’ve even got followed by a sasaeng taxi.”

“Should we be happy with it? Idiot.”

After that, the members’ mouths moved nonstop. There was nothing to refer to and there was no phone, so the time seemed to pass quickly if they talked to each other.

“But, won’t they just leave after getting this?”

“If it’s like that, there’s nothing to say. If I sit down all day on the narrow seats, I’ll probably go out in the middle.”

“Still, I heard that nowadays fans who couldn’t get the fan seat are waiting outside in case there’s an empty seat.”

“We also have fans like that, right?”

Ian assimilated into the noisy atmosphere and chatted together.