CH 23

Chapter 23 – The Truth And You

Is its existence very important?

The contrast and expressiveness displayed by these two idols, whom no one had any expectations for in the beginning, had gone beyond the imagination of the editor-in-chief. The secular prejudice he had held against idols was broken at the moment when these two bravely collided all their thoughts together and released amazing creativity.

They weren’t like usual idols, but they seemed to deserve the title of an idol even more. 

“I can already imagine the scene when this set of pictures gets onto the Hot Search list,” said the editor-in-chief to Lin Mo. Lin Mo just lit up a cigarette before saying, “You should think more about the scene when people are frantically trying to seize copies of the magazine.”

“That’s true. When I changed the cover, I just saw their potential.” The editor-in-chief laughed and continued praising, “They’re topical, beautiful, and they have real skills; in this circle, such children will only become more and more popular.”

Immediately following after the photoshoot was the magazine interview. Fang Juexia’s eyes felt a bit uncomfortable, so he removed his eye makeup first before coming back and sitting down beside Pei Tingsong. At the beginning, there was a quick Q&A session, in which the host, from behind the camera, asked the two of them questions one by one.

“What’s the food you can never get tired of eating?”

Pei Tingsong said offhand, “Cheeseburger, without pickles.”

Fang Juexia said with a look of hesitation, “Shrimp dumplings ba.”

“Who is the most caring person in the group?”

Pei Tingsong didn’t even think about it before opening his mouth, “Miao Ge, his special hobby is taking care of people.” Saying that, he then added, “Though He Ziyan also takes great care of Miao Ge… But if we’re talking about who is the most caring person in the group, it’s still Miao Ge.”

Fang Juexia also agreed. “Captain, maybe because he’s taken care of his little sister since childhood.”

“What are the most common recreational activities in the dormitory?”

Fang Juexia replied, “En… Playing games?”

Pei Tingsong shrugged. “Sorry, I just moved into the dormitory, so I’m not fit to answer this question.”

The host laughed loudly. “What’s your favorite book recently?”

Pei Tingsong picked up the tail of a small dinosaur pillow on the sofa. “The Roots of Romanticism,” Then, he looked at Fang Juexia and added, as if on purpose, “Recommend it for you.”

Fang Juexia knew that Pei Tingsong was implying that he wasn’t romantic, but he didn’t refute his remark at all. After all, there was nothing wrong with this statement. He simply raised his right eyebrow, in a rare fashion, and answered the previous question as if nothing had happened. “Recently, I’ve been reading The Outsiders.” After saying that, he also looked at Pei Tingsong on purpose and countered, “Very suitable for you.”

These two people seemed to be battling over something, for it was obvious that their two disjoint magnetic fields were differentiated and repelling each other. Even the host started laughing. “Next question, what do you guys do when you have insomnia?”

Pei Tingsong replied, “Listen to songs, read books, write something.”

Fang Juexia replied, “Play Sudoku or Rubik’s cube.”

“What’s the fun of a Rubik’s cube?” Pei Tingsong asked.

Fang Juexia smiled and responded, “If you have memorized most of the formulas for the Rubik’s cube, you can experience the fun of it.”

“Coffee or tea?”

Pei Tingsong replied, “Coffee.”

Fang Juexia answered, “Black tea.”

“The preferences you guys have are pretty far apart, eh.” The more the host asked, the more interesting she felt this was. Obviously, they were two people in the same group, and they were a CP pair that was quite hot right now, but their interests and hobbies were poles apart.

“What’s your favorite variety show?”

Just after feeling how could they not match at all, an unexpectedly unanimous answer arrived— “Escape For Your Life.”

The host asked, “Is it because one of the regular guests is your senior brother Shang Sirui?”

Fang Juexia explained with a smile, “Of course, but the program itself is also excellent. When watching, all of us will become very nervous. Before, when the first season was airing, we would chase after updates in the dorm, and everyone would discuss the plot and the identity of the killer.”

Pei Tingsong was very straightforward with his answer. “Some of the script settings are very interesting, and there are a lot of word games, so it’s more interesting than most reality shows.”

His words were too straightforward, but it seems that everyone was used to it by now. The host said with a laugh, “The program group and the screenwriters for ‘Escape For Your Life’ should be very happy when they hear that. Last quick Q&A question, what’s your favorite movie?”

Pei Tingsong quickly answered, “Dead Poets Society, the Chinese name seems to be…”

“《死亡诗社》,” Fang Juexia answered for him.

Pei Tingsong nodded. “Yes, 《死亡诗社》.” He was a little surprised. Did this mean that Fang Juexia also liked this movie?

The host asked again, “Then what’s Juexia’s favorite movie?”

Fang Juexia replied, “En… Fermat’s Last Theorem.”

Pei Tingsong asked, “It’s a movie?” 

Fang Juexia nodded. “A documentary.”

“Why do you like this one?” He was simply curious.

Fang Juexia lowered his eyes, which was the action he often employed when thinking through things. He tried to explain simply, “Because it really moved me.” With that, he added, “Every time I watch it, it moves me.”

Pei Tingsong still wanted to keep asking about this because he was really curious. He wanted to know why a documentary named after a mathematical theorem would move Fang Juexia to such an extent. However, the host had already cued up for the next stage and was ready to start the questions for the formal interview section, so he had to give up.

Cheng Qiang had already read the outline of the questions prepared for the interview, and there weren’t any very difficult questions. However, Fang Juexia wasn’t really a person who was good at interviews, so most of his answers to the questions were pretty shallow. Although Pei Tingsong was much younger, he was never afraid of expressing himself and always seemed to be in control of the whole situation.

The host began to ask, “A few days ago, Kaleido performed their debut song at a broadcasted gala. En, as we all know, a little accident happened that day. We are all very curious about what kind of mood or state you guys were in during the moment of the accident? Is there anything you can share with us?”

They all knew that they couldn’t escape this question, the magazine was just like a waterfront tower being the first to catch the moon, and so they became the first party to raise this question.

Fang Juexia was a little worried that Pei Tingsong would be too frank while answering, so he went first, “First of all, we are very grateful to the organizers for giving us this opportunity. Yes, in fact, our group has had a long gap period, and this was a very hard to come by stage, so we all practiced for a very long time. In fact, when the accident happened, we were actually very nervous, and there was no time to actually think about too many things, so our first reaction was to continue the performance. We also believed that the backstage staff were working hard to try and repair the sound system, so we couldn’t give up that easily. At that time, our mentality was quite simple.”

What he said was very polite and gave CloudTV enough face, as if they had prepared for an incident like this in advance because they knew there would be such a problem. Of course, Pei Tingsong knew why he had said that, and he also knew that Fang Juexia would be more worried than others about this matter. He was often the representative for the entire Kaleido group, and he had to be responsible for it.

If this interview had happened before, Pei Tingsong would definitely have happily said whatever he wanted to say, but upon seeing the person next to him, even he began to worry about this matter.

The host then asked, “After the performance, this song has also become a popularly searched song on major music platforms, and it’s now ranked #1 on the basis of  the number of clicks and downloads for it. I also went to listen to it, and then I realized that some of the words in the rap seemed to be different from the studio version of the song. Did you change the words on-stage?”

Sensitive questions were suddenly being posed. Fang Juexia couldn’t help but look at Pei Tingsong.

Pei Tingsong just laughed calmly and replied, “Yes, I was getting high from singing at the time, so I changed it a bit. I often change words on the spot. You know, people’s inspiration often comes from strong emotional collisions. When you’re on a live stage, with people’s emotions so full and intense, that moment is very suitable for freestyle.”

Fang Juexia also added, “He’s often like this, and he also really likes to liven up the atmosphere of a performance. He doesn’t really like for us to have the exact same performance every single time.”

“However, boybands still tend to emphasize an overall consistency in their performances, and there isn’t much free space for them to maneuver in. In this case, why did Tingsong choose to join a boyband?” The host took the opportunity to throw out a new hot potato, one that hadn’t been written down in the outline of the questions for the interview. 

Standing behind the camera, Cheng Qiang immediately went on alert. After all, Pei Tingsong really hadn’t volunteered to make his debut with a boyband. If this guy told the truth again, they would be in trouble.

On one hand, Fang Juexia was as worried as Cheng Qiang, but on the other hand, was also a bit curious about Pei Tingsong’s answer. He felt that he himself was acting strange. Pei Tingsong was just like a knife, and whenever he drew closer to him, he would be afraid of this weapon, but also would be even more enraptured in wondering if this knife was sharp or blunt. 

“I just talked about my favorite movie ba, Dead Poets Society. There is a line in it, and since I have only seen the original version, I can only recite the line in English— “I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life…to put to rout all that was not life; and not, when I had come to die, discover that I had not lived.”

What Fang Juexia found amazing was that he was also impressed by this line.

[ I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life…to put to rout all that was not life; and not, when I had come to die, discover that I had not lived.]

Pei Tingsong continued, “The woods in my heart belong to more than one kind of forest. It could be fir, or it could be cedar. I’m so young, so why shouldn’t I go from a fir forest to a cedar forest, and maybe in the future, there will also be a maple forest, a cherry forest… I want to try living all kinds of life—being a poet, a writer, a hip-hop artist, a boyband member… There are countless woods on my wish list, and I want to live like this, so that’s why.”

What he said made Fang Juexia come to the realization that this usually arrogant and childish person was indeed nourished by and had grown up in a humanities environment. He was free, and was extremely proud of his ability to pursue this kind of freedom. Even if it was just to cover up the facts and deal with the interview, he could still say something poetic and true. 

What if this was directed to him?

The stage was the only forest he wanted to go deeper into.

It seemed that the host had not expected for Pei Tingsong to reply with such an answer. She was slow in replying by half a beat and couldn’t help sighing emotionally. “I never thought it would be such an answer, it’s truly worth pondering over.” This impromptu question was originally posed to make things harder for Pei Tingsong, but the way he just defused the entire situation like that and persuaded everyone with his reasoning was really surprising. 

He really wasn’t just a regular idol. 

“Next question: Both of you are members of a male idol group, and nowadays, there is a generally accepted notion that idols are selling fantasies. What do you guys think of this?”

This question seemed very ordinary, but in fact, it had always been a hotly discussed topic online, and the opposition to this view was also quite strong. For idols like them, answering such a question was akin to walking on thin ice.

Pei Tingsong only briefly thought for a few seconds before putting his opinion forward, “I understand this kind of statement. Since idols, to some extent, are different from the kind of occupations other artists have; the sense of distance is less with an idol, and they’re compared to a perfect image that’s far away from human nature, so idols are more like beautiful goods in the window. People like you because your perfect image creates a kind of illusion that stimulates their desire. Most of the time, it’s not really the real you they are seeing; they won’t see your shortcomings and bad habits, or the dark side of your human nature.”

“They actually fold that part of themselves away in order to be like an idol, so once all of an idol’s real traits are spread out, the people will definitely see a considerable gap from their expectations. To be honest, saying that idols sell fantasies is also true. The more you prune and shape your external image to be closer to perfection, the higher the fantasy value, and the heavier the burden you have to bear. “

What he said was very straightforward, and the strict logic of his argument laid all the facts out under the bright sun— it seemed as if he totally wasn’t a member of the idol circle. Thus, when he finished talking, all the staff members present were surprised. However, this person, Pei Tingsong, could not be measured or predicted using common sense. 

“What about Juexia? What do you think?” The host tried to cue Fang Juexia into responding, because he had always been very reticent in the face of every single question before. 

“Obviously,” said Fang Juexia, “this is already the mainstream view. However, I still may have to refute it a little bit.”

This was a rare scene, especially, the word “refute” seemed very explosive, and even the host was excited. “Really? What do you think?”

“It is true that the kind of situation Tingsong just spoke of exists, and its universality cannot be tested. In fact, for many fans, their liking is not as simple as some kind of stimulated desire, but is actually very complex. Of course, I don’t deny the existence of this kind of stimulated like; it is very normal, and liking something itself is a kind of desire. No matter how it is classified and explained, the emotional essence of liking something belongs to the category of desire. It’s just that there is a difference in the proportion of how much desire for something in particular exists in someone’s liking. For example, maybe I like an idol, and in my liking for him, desire only accounts for 10%, while for my friend, the proportion of desire in his liking is 80%.”

Pei Tingsong listened and became interested in his point of view. Fang Juexia always seemed to be able to quantify his thinking in a certain manner, as if he was in pursuit of accuracy and precision, which was amazing to him.

Fang Juexia continued, “I think for most fans, the proportion of desire in their liking is not as high as the public imagines. It may also satisfy the normal distribution, with it being less at both ends and significantly more in the middle. Therefore, idols are not so much selling fantasies as they are embodying dreams; they are not stimulating desire, but actually providing emotional motivation.”

He realized that his manner of expression might not be easy enough to understand, but he had already done his best, so he paused and put it more bluntly, “Real life is pretty hard, and everyone has their own difficulties. There are so many occasions during which the word ‘dreams’ feels far away and rather empty to everyone. Therefore, people begin to feel that their dreams are out of their reach. In my opinion, idols who succeed are actually the embodiment of a dream. They are like a proof, and with the existence of this person, everyone can really see the existence of the dream as well.”

“Is its existence very important?” Pei Tingsong suddenly asked.

“Of course, its existence means that there actually also exists a realistic path to the final answer, which proves that dreams can be realized.” After saying that, he showed a smile and stated, “In this hard world, that is something really amazing.”

His manner of expressing himself was more vivid than ever, especially his last phrase, which basically showed that he was in high spirits. 

It was as if he was saying—You see, that’s why I wanted to be an idol.

I will be the proof of that existence.

Pei Tingsong couldn’t help being stunned at this and looked at him, completely entranced. 

He thought that of the moment when Lin Mo had asked him if it was a pity that he had become an idol. If it had been in the past, he wouldn’t have hesitated to say what a pity it was, because this really wasn’t the path he had wanted to choose. If it wasn’t because he felt responsibility towards the group, he wouldn’t have been afraid to say it. 

But then he had seen Fang Juexia, who had been pondering dance moves while stepping through the snow, after which he couldn’t utter the words, ‘it’s a pity.’

The existence of this light had shaken his once firm judgment.

The atmosphere turned a little subtle, and the host said with a smile, “It seems that although you guys are in the same group, you often have completely different views ah.” She jokingly mentioned the anti-materials that were spreading online, “I think the rumors on the Internet that say that you don’t get along are actually…”

Cheng Qiang was very sensitive to this kind of topic, and for the purpose of protecting his artists, he tried to interrupt, “This one, we’ll just…”

“It’s fine.” Pei Tingsong said with a clear smile, “Qiang Ge, what can’t be said here?”

If it was only Fang Juexia alone here, he would actually have a hard time dealing with such a topic. This rumor wasn’t like the groundless wind that he was used to facing from before, the discord being discussed here between them was true; they really had maintained a cold war relationship for two years. It was hard for him to smile and lie to everyone about how deep their friendship was and how close they were.

Yet, at this time, he had become very contradictory. On one hand, he couldn’t answer this, but on the other hand, he was curious about what Pei Tingsong would say. Plainly speaking, this person was usually the one who hated lying the most. 

Would he admit to it directly?

Fang Juexia’s palms were braced against the sofa. He warned himself to be psychologically prepared, because with Pei Tingsong here, anything could happen. It was only because everyone knew about Pei Tingsong’s trait of always being an explosive subject that he had become the focus of the interview. 

He heard Pei Tingsong say, “The rumors that we don’t get along, I understand ah. After all, the modern Internet is so developed that the cost of creating rumors is also reduced. Probably, when everyone sees the scene from before, they will become even more sure of the fact that we don’t get along ba.” Saying this, he started laughing and then continued, “However, when you look at Aristotle and his mentor, Plato, did they also not erupt into a war-like debate over the concept of ‘universalism’?” Pei Tingsong’s education had made him used to seeking out examples for his arguments himself. “And Brutus, did he not love Caesar? After his successful assassination of Caesar, he said frankly, ‘I love Caesar, but I love Rome more.”

Fang Juexia’s fingers relaxed. He hadn’t expected such a result.

These examples were too cunning, and it was only Pei Tingsong who dared to make these kinds of analogies without blushing or feeling his heart race. 

Saying that, Pei Tingsong looked at Fang Juexia and quoted one of the famous sentences handed down by Aristotle, the ancient Greek sage—

“Plato is dear to me, but dearer still is truth.”

I love my teacher, but I love the truth more.

“You’re the same, aren’t you?” He laughed as he called out, “Juexia Ge.”