A Year to Change Your Lives

Chapter 48

If you were to ask Reader, the passage of time, sometimes steady, sometimes tediously slow and sometimes a little quicker than usual, was now hurtling along at a break-neck pace and mercilessly dragging her with it. She'd have bargained all her back teeth for another week where none existed. The clock was running down and as of the first days in October the ticket lottery had been closed and those lucky enough to be attending her Seoul concerts in under a month's time had been informed and paid their dues.

The number of things which had to be squeezed into the dwindling hours seemed to be growing every day rather than shrinking. All of the department meetings concerning the concert had gone from conceptual chats to quick and dirty decision-making sessions. You'd show up, furiously agree or tensely argue and then leave in a daze. Whatever was done would have to be forgotten just as a quickly because there was no time to go back and second guess yourself. If a decision was made about the set, they all had to live with it and factor it in for every conversation thereafter. Same with the costumes, same with the styling, same with the set list, same with the choreography.

The final pieces had all been locked in and re-recorded. As part of Jungkook's promise to think about some kind of provision for Reader following her severance from HYBE, he had brought her to the recording floor one day, trailing the others. She'd tried to argue with him, they didn't really have time and she knew they were completely done with the vocals. The album was well into production now.

"Why are you all so pleased with yourselves?" Reader grumbled as they made their way in and bowed at the strangers in the room. They all ignored her.

"We're here because we just need to approve the credits for the album. They'll be sent out with the press release later this week and they get printed and stuff so we're just proof-reading them." Explained Namjoon.

"For this, you pulled me out of dance?" Reader huffed at Jungkook. She had no business proof-reading these things. Least of all because they would be in Korean!

"Just behave yourself please and look at the copy. We had asked, I think for an English one." One of the staffers nodded and reached behind on the desk for the typed sheet.

Reader, still a little mystified took the paper and dutifully scanned it. She saw, as she expected to, her name printed next to those tracks she'd recorded for. But, encouraged by Jungkook to read on, she saw her name again, credited as a writer no less, against a song which she hadn't ever sung, much less contributed to.

"What?" She looked up, incredulously at the grinning team of boys. "What is this? I didn't write anything."

"Yes you did." Namjoon told her. The song was mostly his with the vocals, chorus and bridge from Jungkook and Tae. Reader, too distracted by all the things she did need to know hadn't bothered to learn anything about a song she didn't. She only knew it was one of the tracks which had been recently re-recorded to reflect the albums new themes.

"You said some lines, in the past, and I remembered them. So now they are in a song." Explained Jungkook simply, as though those sentences were as naturally connected as he'd made them sound.

"What things did I say?" She asked. The production team, standing patiently by, handed Reader an English lyric sheet. There was a lot of it; it was a wordy song, but Jungkook stroked his thumb over the chorus chunks.

"There's no one who could take me away from you. If everyone in the world hated me, it wouldn't be enough to stop me from loving you." Reader read carefully. She didn't remember these words but the phrasing was more organically English than their lyrics tended to be. "I said these words?" She asked, gaping.

"You said these words." Jungkook nodded, triumphantly.

Reader was stunned. "But, you can't do this." She said, shocked, turning to Namjoon. Her name was listed alongside his, as well as some genuine people who had genuinely worked hard on the lyrics and the melodies for this track. "It's not fair." She protested.