Stay - Yang Jungwon 양 정원

𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐒𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐍

Jungwon immediately bear hugged me, "Nooo! Don't cry! I already saw you cry this week!" He exclaimed.

Geonu shook his head hopelessly, "He's such a puppy dog for you."

I laughed and patted Jungwon's head as he let go of my body, "Well his charm is working. We should get ready for dinner and then bed. We have a hard time ahead of us."

Jungwon and Geonu nodded, "Yes Chae!" They said in unison making me giggle.

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During the last ten minutes of our preparation time we were in the lobby warming up our bodies.

Unlike the others I kept trying to do anxiety management exercises. I had no plans to have a panic attack mid-performance.

I sat on one of the stairs away from the others trying to gather myself. I felt my control over my anxiety slipping. I dug my nails into the skin of my legs so badly there were red marks.

My breathing became staggered and frantic. My body wouldn't stay still. The room started spin and it was like the air was being squeezed out of me.

While trying to catch my breath a pair of arms wrapped around me, "Hey, hey, what's wrong?"

I recognized that voice.

"Jungwon," I tried taking a deep breath, "I can't do it. Why in hell's name did I think I could do it?!"

Jungwon sat on the stair next to me, "Chaeri, we have four minutes. You've been practicing so hard for the last week, on top of leading all of us. We were able to synchronize because you helped all of us. You got this. Just breath okay?"

I slowly took a breath. Then another one. Then another. Until I got into a steady pattern. When I was finally calmed down I turned to Jungwon, "Thank you."

Jungwon nudged me, "It's no problem. And I wasn't lying. You got this in the bag. I believe in you okay?"

I noticed that everyone was waiting by the gate as the minutes counted down. I took in one finally deep breath and nodded, "Let's do this."

━━━━━━━ •♬• ━━━━━━━

The walk back to I-Land was a daze. I put all my effort into that performance and I wasn't even sure if it was enough.

Geonu and Jungwon were immediately at my side the second we arrived back on the lobby, "So, what do you think our chances are?" Geonu asked.

I ran my hand through my hair, "I'm not sure. It was all a blur."

Jungwon nodded, "Is it just me or was the more exhausting than it should have been."

I smiled, "Welcome to my life." I muttered before I fell back into my chair.

When we were all gathered the system started up, "Here are the test results."

All of us groaned, "Don't do it, don't do it." I heard Jake beg.

While waiting for the scores I felt my heart beating like crazy, "First, here's the elimination table." we had it explained to us. Each of us will be given an evaluation score by the producers, adding up to our average score. If the average score is less than 65, seven I-Landers will be voted down to the Ground and seven grounders will be chosen to move up to I-Land.