Chapter 154

When his name got called as a candidate for tenth place, Seok was calmer than he'd expected.

Maybe because I got all the mental prep done yesterday…?

The night before, he'd tidied up every last thing in the dorm and packed his suitcase.

That hadn't been simply an act of clearing out his belongings — it had been closer to a process of clearing out his own attachments.

If today he survived and went back to the dorm and unpacked those bags again, that would be a joy in its own way.

And if today he was cut and had to head home instead, then even so — Seok felt like, now, he could close that dorm door without hesitation and step out into the world.

…still, I made it this far.

That plain fact struck Seok all over again.

Only a few months ago, he'd been a general-class trainee on the chopping block, someone for whom debut wasn't even a dream. And now, here he was, ranked high enough to compete for a finals ticket right in front of him.

"…."

"…mmph."

At the pained little sound coming from beside him, Seok's eyes turned. Beside him, Jaeyoung had his two hands clasped tight, as if in prayer, and was trembling. The tears must have started well before, because his face was streaked all over with tear tracks.

Seok thought about it for a moment.

He and Jaeyoung had been in the same general class, but they'd never been especially close….

Even so — in a moment like this, he wanted to be at least the kind of hyung Jaeyoung could lean on.

"Jaeyoung-ah."

"Ngh, …yes?"

"Want to hold hands? I'm shaking too."

"…."

When Seok quietly held his hand out, Jaeyoung hesitated a moment as if it were a bit unexpected, then finally released the two hands he'd been holding tightly clasped. And then, carefully, he took Seok's hand.

"Hyung. Even if you get through and I get cut, I really, really can congratulate you for real, from the heart. I'll congratulate you the best I know how."

"Yeah. Same for me."

"Honestly, me getting to do Miro Maze at all was already this ridiculous thing. So — I'm really, really okay. I really can be okay even if I get cut here."

"I'm the same, more or less. Whichever of us makes it, let's root for each other."

"Yes…. Ugh, if I get cut this time, what am I even going to say to Yoon Taehee. He kept telling me to survive as long as I possibly could and debut, you know. Ah, thinking about not having to do the diet plan anymore does feel a bit like a relief, though."

Jaeyoung seemed like the type who got talkative when he got anxious.

While the camera moved for staging and Seo Taeil looked over his lines, Jaeyoung chattered away, cheerfully rambling. At the name Taehee — one he hadn't heard in a while — Seok was slightly surprised, but smiled and welcomed it.

"Right. How's Taehee doing?"

"I don't know. Since we started this thing, I really haven't had a chance to be in touch…. Ah, but he came to see our guerrilla concert not long ago, apparently. Oh, right, hyung — he asked me to tell you he thought your stage was really good."

"Taehee did? He came out that day?"

"Yeah. Ah, hyung. I'm really so nervous, what do I do?"

Between the tension, Jaeyoung looked like he was one wrong breath away from bursting into tears again.

Seok gripped Jaeyoung's hand once more, held it tight, and smiled at him warmly.

"…it's okay. We put in the work."

So whatever result came out — Seok felt like, now, he was going to be okay.

"Everyone! We're going to start recording again! Rolling!"

At the PD's call — the reset apparently done, recording resuming — tension crept back into the hands the two of them held clasped.

The stopped lights started spinning again. Without a word, Seok looked long at a single light hanging from the ceiling.

For a long, long time.

So that this dazzling, bright, almost-blinding light would stay in his memory for a long, long time to come.

---

The moment of parting was plainer than he'd braced himself for.

"The second cut ceremony, deciding who takes hold of the last finals ticket. Tenth place is…."

"…."

"…Trainee Park Jaeyoung, who showed us new challenges every round with astonishing growth."

The moment his name was called, Jaeyoung ended up sinking right down to the floor. Even in the middle of it he didn't lose his grip on Seok's hand, so Seok — still holding it tight — dropped down to his knees along with him and pulled Jaeyoung into a hug.

"Congratulations, Jaeyoung-ah. You did well."

Jaeyoung wrapped his arms back around Seok, repeating I'm sorry, thank you over and over, endlessly. Even at Seo Taeil's cue to give his passing remarks, he kept clinging to Seok and crying, so in the end Seok had to soothe him and send him off to the platform.

"I really, really think this is a place way beyond what I deserve, and… hng, I, ha, really didn't think I could ever come up as far as here…. hueng, uh, ah, what am I even supposed to say….."

Just like last time, Jaeyoung's passing remarks were once again a tearful mess. Seok listened to Jaeyoung's remarks too, with a settled heart. Jaeyoung — helped up by ninth-place Jayden — took his spot in tenth.

And now, it was his turn to say goodbye.

The three eliminated trainees stepped up onto the platform. While Kyungho and Yuki laid out their own last stories in their own ways, Seok, in his own way, thought about what he should say.

By the time the mic had gone around and around and come back to him, Seok — feeling a good deal lighter — opened his mouth.

"I always felt like I was living as a supporting character."

Supporting character.

Was there a word that painted his own life more precisely than that?

"Every time I felt how lacking I was while doing Miro Maze, this spot was too heavy, too scary — sometimes I wanted to run away too."

Seok looked at the ten boys standing across from him.

Bright and beautiful by any measure, they would one day become the stars of that world he'd once so admired.

But so what?

"Thank you for making even someone like me shine, Destis."

Seok remembered the voice from the guerrilla concert — someone calling his name in a cheer.

He remembered the ones who'd shaken a slogan with his name on it, telling him they'd been comforted by his song.

In their memories, he would forever be someone who had shone.

"Even though my journey in Miro Maze has come to an end, I'll hold the shining moments I spent here close, and go on living, bravely."

He'd thought life was like the waves — once everything was swept away, that was the end.

But some lives, he'd learned, were like butterflies — just staying and flying wherever they went could make yet another flower bloom.

Seok wanted to remember today not as a day of failure and defeat, but as the day he'd finally found the courage to try opening another door.

"Thank you for listening to my songs, this whole time."

With that last line, Seok pushed back the sob rising all the way up to his throat.

When he closed his mouth on the end of his remarks, the set no longer held applause, no exclamations — only the sound of sniffling.

"…those who would reach the sun, fly high. The final journey to find Miro's Icarus. Which seven trainees will claim the ultimate victory in the finals live broadcast? Please, stay with these boys' challenge all the way to the end."

Eyes just as red, Seo Taeil made it through the closing line — voice thick — without incident.

The signal came around that recording had ended, but the production team didn't give the cast any particular direction, as if telling them to take all the time they needed to share the sorrow of elimination and the pain of parting.

In that setting, the first to come over to the eliminated trainees was Seo Taeil.

"Seok-ah."

"Ah, sunbaenim…. Thank you for everything."

"…yeah. You worked hard. You really did well."

Seo Taeil hugged Yuki, Kyungho, and Seok — each in turn — and comforted them with a good work.

Getting comforted like this, in person, by a top-star of the idol world he'd once felt like he couldn't even meet eyes with — Seok couldn't help thinking, in a small, silly way, that the world he'd been in had really been another world entirely.

Once Seo Taeil moved on, next it was the ten passing trainees — the ones who'd been standing up on the platform — coming down in a rush.

Even ill will forges its own kind of bond, apparently — even Kyungho, who'd picked fights all along, was bawling in Siwoo's arms. Yuki was trading goodbyes with the maknae-line kids — Eunchan, Haru, and Jaeyoung — and someone genuinely unexpected came over to Seok.

"Hyung."

"Oh, hey. Yeah, Doha-yah. Congrats on second. Really, you're something."

"…."

Doha, who'd been through month-end evaluations with him, stood planted right in front of Seok and hesitated a moment. Puzzled, Seok watched Doha — and then, seeing Doha open his arms with an awkward expression, let out a stupid little ah. At Doha asking for a hug, Seok too, awkwardness all over him, stepped up hesitantly and hugged him back.

"…hyung."

"Yeah?"

"Hyung, sometimes when you're placing sound really well in head voice, you have this habit of suddenly pushing into raw chest voice. When you're going up on the highs, you could clearly push them further — I think it's the anxiety of what if I can't do it? that makes you cut it short. You can sing more than you're doing — you should give yourself the confidence."

"Uh, uh…?"

At the coaching dropped on him out of nowhere, Seok's emotional glass shattered like a window smashed to pieces.

Seok, thrown off the mood for a moment, quickly pulled himself together and stammered a reply.

"Ah, yeah. Y-yeah. Thanks."

"Just fixing that alone, you could sing so much better than you do now."

"……?"

"…so, whichever way it takes, I hope you keep singing."

Your songs are good, hyung.

At that one line, delivered so plainly, in the end Seok couldn't hold back the tears he'd been fighting anymore.

"If what I said maybe offended you—"

"No, no. It's not that, it's not that at all. Thanks, Doha-yah. Thanks for saying that."

"…."

"Really, thank you."

Wiping his tears away in a hurry, Seok told Doha, from the heart, how grateful he was.

Doha bowed his head to Seok in return, then turned to go trade goodbyes with the others.

And in the spot Doha had turned away from, Seok came face to face with someone looking at him with an expression that seemed one wrong breath away from crying.

"…yaah. Hajin, what are you doing crying. If anyone's going to cry, I should be the one."

When Seok, forcing a smile, teased him with that, Hajin finally let the tears fall in fat drops and came striding over. Seok took Hajin — a fair bit taller and bigger than himself — into a hug that took some effort.

"Hajin, you have to debut, without fail. Even after you debut, you have to keep shining, for a long, long time. Got it?"

"Supporting character, my ass…. Who said that. Who the hell says that. Bring me every last bastard talking like that."

"Still — thanks to you, Hajin, I'm walking away having really, really learned a lot. Don't act like you don't know me just because I got cut."

"Hyung, you're the one who needs to answer my messages properly. Still taking ten-minute breaks between kakaos before answering — the nerve."

The tone was as fierce as it got, but with his mumbling-through-tears diction and his voice all closed up, none of it was scary at all. Seok let out a soft laugh and patted the back of Hajin, still holding him tight. Somehow, it felt like the direction of comforting had flipped — but, all things considered, Seok didn't mind.

Seok watched Hajin — slowly pulling back from him — and gave him a spirited smile.

"Hajin-ah, hey….."

Seok thought back to something Hajin had said, some time ago.

That everything, up until the period is written, is just process.

"Do you think, for me too?"

"…."

"Do you think, for me, this is also just process?"

At Seok's question, Hajin's face crumpled again, terribly. As if trying to hold back tears, Hajin dropped his head — then barely managing to steady his expression, lifted his head and spoke.

"Of course, hyung."

"…yeah?"

"I've been around a bit, you know, and turns out it's true what they say — life has no right answer. So what if you don't have one? It's not like anyone's grading it."

Hajin took both of Seok's hands in his, and gave him that easy smile of his — the one he always wore.

"Your tomorrow's going to shine even brighter, hyung."

Hajin's line, said with a smile, sounded almost like an incantation.

Which was why, in the moment he heard it, Seok felt that the time had really come to open this door and step through.

"Yeah. Thanks, Hajin-ah."

Thanks to you, I made it this far.

The words rising to the tip of his tongue, Seok swallowed them back in the end.

Today — instead of any because of so-and-so or thanks to so-and-so, it felt like it would be enough just to look back on this road he himself had walked, all on his own.

"I'll keep cheering you guys on. Fighting."

Glad I'm able to say this line with heart in it now.

With that thought, Seok broke into a bright, bright smile.

A smile brighter than any he'd worn.