Chapter 9 - Skinny, Skinny

Suu Jin stared at the camera, dancing to the choreography to his new single. He moved perfectly and sent a smile when needed to. His hips swayed, before his body hit the moves powerfully. When he was finished, he thanked his dancers and went to grab the towel from one of the staff.

"Well done, Jin. Took you only a couple days to learn the dance and song. This is why you are my number one," his manager Yaotzu smiled and patted his shoulder, "Clean up. You have 6 interviews to promote the new single."

The man signaled to everyone to wrap everything up. Taking a drink of his water, he wiped his face and sweat off his skin. Running fingers through his hair, he went for his phone. Sticking his wireless earbud in one ear, he played his playlist of the group 1Luv. Closing his eyes, he calmed his mind to get himself ready for the next thing.

Always a next thing.

*Ding*

He heard the notification and saw that Shun had sent him a message. Opening it up, he noticed it was a voice note. Playing it, Jin felt his lips quirked into a smile.

"Senior Jin, I know you are really busy and I am sorry. Can you listen to this? Manager Quang made us learn a new song. Just let me know when you are free. Please do not push yourself."

He listened to Shun's tone.

The boy's voice was strong and it carried wide, but there was slight vulnerability within it. Jin felt that was rare to find and he envied it. His own voice was soft and too vulnerable sounding, but people loved it. He preferred a voice like Shun's instead.

"Jin. Car is ready," one of his bodyguard informed and he nodded. Leaving the studio, he entered the car and finished listening to the voice note.

"Shun," he replied, "During the "miss me, miss me, you will miss me", sound more desperate. Everything else is very well done. You've improved a lot. You are a quick learner. Keep it up."

He sent the voice note and took a deep breath as he entered the crowd of reporters. He smiled, nodded, complimented, and answered the questions easily. It was hard before, but being in the spotlight for so long, Jin was used to it. Did he enjoy it? That was the true question and Suu Jin sometimes feel the answer was no.

However, when he was doing a live and interacting with his fans, he could not help feeling grateful.

"Hello everyone, my cherries."

He saw the hearts flooding his screen and he looked at the chats.

"You all have been supporting me and I thank you all so, so much. I have been working extra hard for this new album. Did you see the teaser?"

His fans were chatting madly in excitement as more hearts floated. He let out a laugh and felt his heart warmed.

"I'll share a tease of the single," he grinned and began singing.

"I see you across the room, holding onto someone new, did you think I didn't know. From the way you hold his hand to the way you smile like that, how could you do this to me. All the memories, stab me like knives, I think I'm gonna die~"

He stopped and winked into the camera.

"That is all for now," he laughed and saw the comments of 'More please!' He shook his head and placed a finger to his lips.

He saw that Shun replied and he opened it to see what it was. He found himself laughing to see the picture of Wen Dong, Xiong Shun, and his little cousin Ping Ping grinning happily with love fingers. His laughter settled and his smile softened.

"My baby cousin Ping Ping and his friends are working really hard to become idols. Let's help them get there," He smiled with his pearly whites, "Want to hear one of them sing?"

Jin played the voice note from Shun and watched as the chat flooded with hearts.

==

Shun was currently staring at his phone. He had no idea how the floating screen got into his phone, but it was. Magic. It had to be that witch's magic that could do this. That wasn't the only thing strange. His raven brows furrowed in confusion as he saw the updated status.

*Confidence 42%-> 55%* *Singing ability 27%-> 29%* *Dancing ability 20%-> 25%* *InstaMe picture uploaded 12/100* *Fan accumulated 776/1000000* *Reached Level 2: Dancing- fluidity*

"When did I get fans?" Shun scratched his head sitting crisscrossed on his bed.

He looked at his Weebo and saw 99+ friend requests and retweets of his one post, the words Jin told him. Blinking with wide brown eyes, he checked out his InstaMe and saw so many likes on his pictures.

"What is this?! 1100 followers?! What is happening?"

Shun shouted and the screen on his phone flickered like it was blinking. Rubbing his face, he decided he'll just go to bed. Maybe this was due to the update from the screen. All he knew was that he was on the right track to becoming an idol.

==

"You bought groceries?" Suu Jin questioned as he drank his coffee.

"Mm. I'll make you breakfast," Shun smiled and was grateful he was able to meet with his senior. He was working hard on keeping his eyes opened and he felt confident he could emote well… at least he hoped so.

"Something light, Shun. I'm on a diet."

"But you are so skinny," he said bluntly and quickly shook his hands before him, as if to calm any perceived anger from the idol, "I don't mean it in a bad way!"

"…"

"You have muscles, so you aren't skinny skinny."

"Shun," Jin leaned his head on his knuckles with his elbow on the island, "How do you know I have muscles?"

"Well…" he flushed and turned away to hide his burning cheeks, "Ping showed me one of your music videos. I haven't seen any and I can see why you have such a big fanbase."

Jin just stared at the back of Shun as the boy busied himself. His green eyes softened and he drank his coffee with a smile.

"I am sure you have muscles too, Shun. Make some breakfast for yourself. We don't want either of us to be skinny skinny."

Jin laughed into his coffee and he heard the groan from the trainee.

'Skinny, skinny.... was never told this before.'