"Chae?"
I blinked multiple times and turned my head towards the door where Geonu and Jungwon were standing. I rubbed my eyes and realized how dry they were, "Were you zoning out on that wall the whole time?"
I frowned, "I suppose so." The two boys sat down on my bed, "What? What happened?"
Jungwon seemed scared, "I may have told the others about your anxiety?"
"Oh is that it?" I asked. At this point I didn't mind. I'll be spending months with these boys so I have to tell them eventually.
"And they were discussing about whether to give back your part to Heeseung." Geonu whispered.
I sighed, "I knew it. They think I can't do it." I muttered.
Jungwon put his hand on my back, "No, no, we haven't decided yet. You're still center."
Geonu grinned, "Jungwon defended you too. I didn't think he was so passionate."
"Because it's wrong that they're judging her capabilities because of her anxiety even though they saw how good she performs." Jungwon argued.
I laughed at their small bickering, "Well thank you both. I'm just- I'm leading practice. I didn't have a slight idea that we'd have a moving stage that complicated. We just started getting in sync. I don't think there's a hope we'll get a good score." I said miserably.
Geonu ruffled my hair, "Come on Chae. Don't think like that. We can do it. You're an amazing leader."
I glanced at the door, "The others don't seem to think so."
"That's because they're worried about you." Jungwon said. I raised my eyebrow, "Okay- well and also they think that it'll interfere with your performance."
I subconsciously leaned my head on Jungwon's shoulder, "Won't it? I barely survived Rain's evaluation."
"You won't overcome your anxiety over night."
I glared at him, "It's been a good 4-5 years. I think that's long enough."
"I honestly think you held it together pretty well." Jungwon pointed out.
Geonu started laughing which made me and Jungwon look at him funny, "Hyung- are you okay?" Jungwon asked.
Geonu started wheezing, "No- it's just- you two- adorable!" Then he fell off the bed, "AGH! Owww I think I hit my funny bone."
I looked at Jungwon then Geonu, "Should we help him?"
Jungwon pouted, "It is the morally right thing to do."
I sighed and looked over the side of the bed where Geonu glared at me, "You okay?"
Geonu got up, holding his elbow, "No thanks to you. But what I was gonna say was you guys known each other for four days and you're already hugging."
I shrugged, "Jungwon just makes me feel comfortable."
Jungwon did a finger gun at me and then winked or tried to. I didn't know how to react, "Jungwon- what the-" All of a sudden I felt flustered. No one has ever winked at me.
I fell backwards on the bed and covered myself with the pillow, "Meanies." I muttered while the two boys laughed at me.
"Hyung she looks cute right?" Jungwon asked innocently. Before Geonu answered I smacked Jungwon with a pillow.
Geonu laughed, "Damn if that wasn't a friend zone I don't know what is."
I sat up and fixed my hair, "I'm going to cry, I swear."
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.
━━━━━━━ •♬• ━━━━━━━
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.
━━━━━━━ •♬• ━━━━━━━
It was time for the producers to discuss Chaeri's score, "Now Chaeri," Rain sighed, "that was probably absolutely terrifying for her." He admitted.
Zico nodded, "She did good, all things considered."
Sung Deuk pursed his lips, "Chaeri's dancing calls for attention. She has so much charisma."
Wonder kid hummed, "Her voice is like honey. It gave me goosebumps."
━━━━━━━ •♬• ━━━━━━━
"Now, from the signal test songs." Our scores will be read out randomly and anonymously.
I slouched in my seat, "Okay no- I can't do this."
Nonetheless the scores appeared on the screen; 47, 70, 40, 66, 61, 58, 46, 75, 78, 59, 67, 57, 65
I was shocked by the scores. The highest and lowest score had a difference of 38. Then the final answer. The averages of our score. The wait felt like forever, I wanted to pull out my hair.
60.
I stared at the screen on disbelief. That was 10 whole points below the margin. Half of I-landers were going to be dropped.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. 60 point average. We did that bad?
"According to the test results, only six I-Landers have survived. Please eliminate seven I-landers."
I felt like the worst teammate ever. I was center, I was their lead in practice. How could I let this happen?
I looked at Jungwon in devastation, "How?" Jungwon asked.
I shrugged, "I don't even know."
The announcer spoke again, "Voting for the member eliminations will begin in 12 hours. Starting now, you can check your individual scores."
"What we're the highest and lowest scores?" Jay asked.
"78 and 40." I answered.
"78 is such a good score." Daniel muttered.
Jay ran a hand down his face, "78..."
"Did Chaeri get 78?" Jungwon wondered out loud.
I shook my head, "Unlikely."
━━━━━━━ •♬• ━━━━━━━
I was sitting with Jungwon on his bed while we talked with Geonu about the whole situation, "How are we going to pick anyone? Picking seven people too difficult." Jungwon asked.
Geonu looked down, "I think everybody realizes what reality is now."
"I was expecting our score to be between the seventies and eighties... not sixties." I added.
"How do you think they're going to vote?" Geonu asked.
"They'll say it's based off the people who needed more work, but usually it's subconsciously people they don't get along with as much." I explained, "So I'm the first candidate."
Jungwon pushed me slightly, "Why would you think that? You're the best here."
I hummed, "As true as that is, that still doesn't erase the fact that I'm not close with all the I-Landers like you guys are. I have my few favorite people and stick to them." I admitted.
Geonu smiled, "Are we your favorite people?"
"Oh definitely." I said without missing a beat, "You guys were the first people to make me feel comfortable."
Geonu looked at Jungwon, "Jungwon- we cannot allow Chae to go to the ground."
Jungwon nodded, "Without Chae I'm going to be miserable!"
I laughed, "Yeah and you're the one staying up here."
Jungwon leaned against me, "You are too. You won't be voted to the Ground." He assured.
I held out my pinkie, "Promise?"
He immediately intertwined his with mine, "Promise."
━━━━━━━ •♬• ━━━━━━━
𝐈-𝐋𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐂𝐎𝐌𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐓𝐒-
Chaeri did so well!! 😍 😍
Chae and Jungwon doing a pinkie promise made my heart melt
I feel so bad for Chaeri! She did her best but she feels like it's her fault
Chaeri better not be voted to the ground, she's my bias :(