NeoNara || TXT || taebin || yeonkai

2015-2016: Intermission

2015-2016: INTERMISSION

King Solomon gets off the hook, press-wise. Taehyun is expecting every news outlet in the Capital Area, if not every music blog known to mankind, to talk about his collapse at NeoNara. He figures they will talk about the stress of being a DJ and the weather, but they'll also probably throw him under the bus, say it was all his fault, and effectively make him unmarketable for the near future.

And then, on the Amtrak ride back to New York City on Tuesday, Taehyun sees something on his phone that makes him scream. TMZ has reported that Polaris Rider has checked into a mental health facility.

Within seconds, the news is the only thing listed on music blogs, Twitter, and the like. Billboard even has a story on it. Reviews of this weekend NeoNara — and King Solomon's show — will have to wait. Nobody's talking about the up and coming DJ who passed out at his own set. Admittedly, they're also not talking about the strange woman who finished his set, but Taehyun will take his luck where he can get it. So King Solomon returns to his city, and nobody is talking about him.

Yeonjun is waiting at the front door with bodega sandwiches; Taehyun's equipment has been returned to his room, all set up. "Whatever you need, let us know and we'll take care of it," he says.

So Taehyun tries his best to return to normal. He talks to the coffee shop, and they are very understanding of his condition; the owner's wife had passed away from a long-term condition several years before. Any time Taehyun needs to take off, he can. Plus, he's still insured by his father, so he can afford to stay at home and be sick, or work on his King Solomon music.

And work he does. He does his best to stay up late every night, thinking of a song to go with Soobin's everybody clap your hands lyric that he had come up with. He ponders the meaning of life. He walks to the park and back, trying to get a clear head. He listens to every mainstream EDM track that has been made over the past few years, indulging in everything from Daft Punk to Calvin Harris to Skrillex.

When he texts Beomgyu about it, he writes back, Don't overthink it. People like simple songs. Make it a pop song with EDM flavoring. You know why Blue Orangeade is so popular? It's a pop song, with punk flavoring. So Taehyun comes up with a sequence of four chords, and instead of rock guitars and bass, he substitutes in his synths and pads. He gives it a funky little beat, and while he has no clue what the melody could be, he leaves it open so it could be anything.

He writes it with Beomgyu in mind, though he knows Beomgyu will never sing this song. He needs a big name if he wants this to get off the ground. Even a medium-sized name could mean it will get airplay, and from there it's a matter of finding the right people to license to. So far, he hasn't collapsed again, and even though he's more fatigued, he hasn't had any issues with his right ear. So he's feeling on top of the world. Things couldn't possibly get better.

Then Soobin officially gets hired by WOIH.

They've taken him on as their night and weekend DJ, so he can work full time. During the weeknights, he covers the late night shift, making sure the radio station keeps going, playing some songs, and occasionally announcing. When he's needed to fill in on the weekends, he'll earn overtime on top of what he's already earning. It means he'll be on a different sleep schedule than Taehyun, but Taehyun is okay with this. The first night Soobin gets home at five in the morning, he slips in next to Taehyun, and the two continue sleeping peacefully without a care in the world.

Soobin's extra hours means that Taehyun doesn't have to worry about paying rent if things get bad. And before long, cracks do start to show. Taehyun stays up late all night fixing the equalizer on a track, and when he wakes up, his right ear feels stuffed up. It's not enough to make him throw up, but it does have him worried. So he goes to bed, and when he gets home, since Soobin is at work, Yeonjun sits with him and they watch a movie. It's annoying, but he can work through it. Taehyun becomes convinced that, as long as he gets enough sleep and doesn't eat like a teenager at their first NeoNara, this problem with his ears will just go away and it will be a once-in-a-while thing that comes up when he's stressed.