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  Never Been Boxed Set

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  The Fangirl Chronicles

  Fangirling Over You

  To All the Footballers I Loved Before

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  Pucked Romance

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  The Cuffing Season Series

  Get Cuffed

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  BIAS WRECKED

  Book Three, The Fangirl Chronicles

  by C.M. Kars

  Copyright © 2021 C.M. Kars

  All rights reserved.

  This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise—without prior written permission of the publisher, except as provided by United States of America copyright law.

  Cover design by Indigo Chick Designs

  Editing by Aquila Editing

  V 1.0 D2D 2022-02-11

  ISBN (ebook) 978-1-990603-04-4

  ISBN (paperback) 978-1-990603-05-1

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Hello Reader,

  I would like to clarify a few points about this story.

  As such, I have taken creative liberties with music shows and other aspects of idol life to help fit the story I wanted to tell. This is by no means a story about the K-pop industry; it is not a story about what K-pop is and what it is not.

  This is a story of two childhood friends finding each other again and restarting their relationship and eventually finding love. One of these people just happens to be an idol.

  You will find a page of terms I use in the following pages, and the Korean romanization next to those words.

  I’ve been slowly self-studying Korean for the past couple of years (with spurts of really heavy studying, while neglecting my language learning for months at a time, because you know, 2020).

  By learning any new language, you become exposed to new words, new concepts, and of course, the culture. I have tried my best to depict the Korean culture with as much respect as possible, but in the course of my research and this writing (I was actually supposed to go to Seoul, but then 2020 happened), I could have misrepresented concepts, or brought too many of my own preconceptions to what I’m talking about.

  No offense was intended in any way, shape, or form. All mistakes are my own.

  If you see something in this book that concerns you, please send me an email at: [email protected].

  Thank you for being here, and I hope you enjoy this story.

  Sincerely,

  C.M. Kars

  TERMS

  Sasaeng(s) –shortened form of sasaenghwal, meaning private or personal life. These are overzealous, delusional (and sometimes dangerous) fans.

  Annyeonghaseyo – Formal greeting of ‘hello’, how you would greet someone who is older than you, or higher status than you (i.e. not to children).

  Yeoboseyo – How Koreans say ‘hello’ when answering the phone.

  Algessumnida – a formal way of saying ‘yes, I understand’ or ‘understood’.

  Hyung – the term used for older brother if you’re a male; also used as a title of sorts to describe a closer relationship between two males, a younger male will address the older male as such (when given permission).

  Oppa – the term used for older brother if you’re a female; also used as a title of sorts to describe a closer relationship between a female and an older male (when given permission).

  Noona – the term used for older sister if you’re a male; also used as a title of sorts to describe a closer relationship between a younger male and an older female.

  Eomeonim – Formal address for ‘mother’; you would use this term when speaking about someone else’s mother or greeting someone else’s mother.

  Abeonim – Formal address for ‘father’; you would use this term when speaking about someone else’s father or greeting someone else’s father.

  Eomeoni/Eomma – a more casual address of ‘mother’/‘mom’

  Abeoji/Appa – a more casual address of ‘father’/ ‘dad’

  Adeul – the term for son

  Yeobo – term of affection ‘honey’

  Maknae – youngest member of the group

  Banchan – small side dishes that accompany the main Korean meal (some of these include: kimchi, pickled radish, soybean sprouts, etc.)

  Japchae – a dish of stir-fried glass noodles and vegetables

  Gochujang – red chili paste that’s used as a base for most Korean dishes

  Chapssaltteok – Korean-style mochi; a rice cake filled with sweet red bean paste.

  Tteokbokki – a popular street food, also known as spicy rice cakes.

  Netizen – slang word for a “citizen of the internet”

  -ssi (suffix) – A suffix you would attach after a person’s full name (or just the first name if you’re closer) to sound more polite. Pronounced as ‘she’.

  - nim (suffix) – A suffix you would attach after a person’s name or title to give the upmost respect, the highest form of honorifics.

  Samgyeopsal – grilled pork belly

  Selca – the Konglish word for “selfie”

  Soju – a Korean distilled alcoholic clear beverage that’s made from rice, wheat or barley.

  They come in green glass bottles and you drink it neat. It also comes in an assortment of fruit flavours with a lower alcohol content.

  OT5 – your bias is all five members of a given group (like Trickshot)

  Fancam – a video taken by a fan in the audience of their idols (some focusing solely on their bias), during a live performance or an award show

  Fansign – a signing event for fans of K-pop groups (and other Korean celebrities). Fans for idol groups at these events are chosen through a lottery system after purchase of a physical album

  Bias – your own favourite member of a given K-pop group

  Bias Wrecker – the member that threatens your bias (i.e. favouritism) of another member and becomes your bias (usually, not always).

  Comeback – the event where any K-pop artist releases new music (could be an EP, mini album, full-length album).

  Contents

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  PUCKED ROMANCE

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ONE

  Waiting in line is always a sucky place to be, but this line in particular really takes the cake. And now I’m thinking about cake.

&n
bsp; Great.

  I hand my I.D.—Quebec issued—and watch the Korean security guard frown at it, looking up at my face and then back down to my driver’s license, confirming that I am, in fact, who I say I am, Raleigh Montgomery.

  I also have to point out where my birth date is—the first time I’ve spoken real Korean aside from the hellos and thank yous to the bus and taxi drivers, and the cashiers at convenience stores—we both do confirm that I am indeed born August 12, in the Year of Our Lord, 1993, and am of age to attend this event.

  The security guard is smartly dressed, standing next to a staff member (I know this because she’s wearing a t-shirt that says STAFF in English on her chest), wearing a headset, a phone in her hand as she welcomes me to the fansign event that’ll start whenever the members of Trickshot take their seats, and they open the doors into the auditorium.

  So I’m still waiting, having hit the first checkpoint in a series of checkpoints that confirms my identity and the identity on my ticket, as I pull up my email confirmation and the date it was issued.

  I’m nodded through, thanking them for their time, because even I’m overwhelmed in the face of all these fans, even if I do count myself among them.

  It’s my first time doing this, too, going to a fansign, or what we’d call a meet-and-greet back home, having won the lottery when I purchased the latest Trickshot album and the end of an era before the band goes on their six-month hiatus.

  That’s not why I’m so nervous and excited though, even though I’m an OT6 stan, and love each member equally. No, my heart’s kicking hard at the prospect of standing in front of him, of seeing him again, after all this time.

  I take my place back in line after I’m buzzed down with the security wand, the thing buzzing when it hits my ears and belly button from my piercings, my cheeks burning at the potential that I could have had my nipples pierced but chickened out before I could get them done, aware that it would make for an awkward situation.

  I fidget from foot to foot, ignoring the odd looks I’m getting, sticking out among the ninety-nine-point nine percent of Korean girls—most of them high schoolers judging by their class uniforms—uh, being not of Korean descent, instead a mish-mash of Irish, Scottish, some Italian and a whole lot of French-Canadian. I cross my arms over my chest, trying to make my five-foot-eight frame smaller, hunching down and ignoring the way that people are looking at me, curious.

  I try to home in on conversations, translating them in my head, letting my mind drift as I think about what our first meeting is going to look like, after all this time, sometime in the very near future when I get to stand in front of him again, the first time I’ll see him in person in almost fifteen years.

  Because in the weirdest turn of events, the one and only Min Jaeyong, one of the members of the K-pop idol group burning their way through the charts much like their predecessors, used to be my best friend, a lifetime ago, back when we were both awkward.

  He wasn’t as tall or as built as he is now, and I didn’t even have my boobs yet, my teeth encased in braces, embarrassed twenty-four seven about having food stuck in them so I wouldn’t smile, and if I did, it would be through covering my mouth with both hands.

  And now we’re here.

  Min Jaeyong’s taller than me now, and my chest filled in (along with the rest of me) and so much time has passed that I’m sure we don’t look like the kids we used to be, like the best friends we used to be.

  Of course there’s the definite possibility that Jaeyong won’t recognize me, won’t know who I am even when I’m standing directly in front of him and decide to speak to him in French, the language he was most comfortable in since I didn’t speak Korean back then.

  Well, other than the bad words that he taught me at the time, when he went by his English name, Lucas, because Jaeyong is kinda hard to pronounce in French.

  And it’s weird, too, that ever since I found out—realized—that Jaeyong was my Lucas from all those years ago—famous now, working hard, looking more beautiful than ever, I became a fan of his too, blurring the lines between an old friendship and dying to find out about what kind of person he’s become, all these years later.

  Does he still watch old Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z episodes like we used to back then, maybe occasionally binges them like I do, remembering a time when we were happier? Does he still have absolutely shitty writing that I couldn’t even read when he passed me notes in class?

  What about that bright yellow Jansport backpack he had a million years ago that he let me decorate when I got my second period (after a six-month hiatus, the bastard) during one of our classes (was it geography or history?) and he took me to the nurse who helped me out, letting the decorating distract me from the embarrassment of leaking through my pants.

  I didn’t know becoming a K-pop idol was a dream of his; it wasn’t something he vocalized, something he said out loud to me. I just knew that he loved to dance, and he loved Taekwondo, and he was apparently very good at both while I tried to manage my abysmal hand-eye coordination and my love of all things that dealt with the fantasy book genre.

  Will Jaeyong still be that boy, who, instead of being grossed out like the rest of the guys in my class would’ve been at the mere mention of the word period, sacrificed his backpack for me to use as a shield for me to take the bus home after the leaking incident?

  Will he still be that one true friend I had, the one I felt I could talk to about anything, anyone, and he’d always answer me truthfully, honestly and calmly? Will he still be one of the best friends I’ve ever had in my entire life?

  Now that I’m older, I know it’s true that I was friends with some people in high school by pure virtue of the fact that I spent eight hours of my day with them, like I do now with some of my work colleagues, searching for something more, something deeper, trying to get that connection back that I felt I had with Lucas—Jaeyong.

  Fuck, will he even remember me?

  And so what if he doesn’t? So what?

  I’ve got a new job here in Seoul, teaching English at a local elementary school in Dongdaemun-gu. My contract is up for renewal after one year, and I’m taking the golden opportunity to get away from home, from Montreal, and looking for a different me in a different place, needing a change of pace so I can kickstart my life in a direction I want it to go in, instead of feeling stuck in a rut like I’ve been in for what feels like forever.

  My stomach twists uncomfortably, and I shake it off, shaking my hair back out of my face, trying to remember if my hair even looked like this back then, now that I finally understand what to do with my thick, wavy hair instead of the frizzy mess it was back in the beginning of high school.

  Oh, shit, what if I look too different, what if he doesn’t recognize me at all?

  Didn’t we just go over this?

  I remember when I first saw him, realized that it was Lucas (Jaeyong) I was looking at as I only got into K-pop three years ago when it took over the radio stations, first with that record-breaking English track from that band that blew up, and then the Korean songs were played more often than the English ones.

  I liked the vibe, but most importantly I liked the lyrics after I looked them up, and it caused me to down spiral into K-pop and find other groups that I could vibe with, finally finding Trickshot among them and their debut song ‘Tricking You’, something poppy and sweet.

  I liked the song and stayed for the music video, the gorgeous outfits (who knew men would look so incredibly amazing in velvet suits and vampire king aesthetic that I didn’t even know I was into?), and the crisp and sharp choreography was just a bonus had me going oh, yeah, I’m into this. More please!

  My bias, and hence my favourite member of the group, wasn’t even Jaeyong in the beginning of my early fangirling over Trickshot.

  I ended up taking a deep dive into the fandom, wanting to know everything about Hoseung, the leader of the group (and also the oldest member) and the rest of the guys, finding so much content on their livestreams, on
their variety show.

  I binged those half-hour episodes that included the group shenanigans and utter chaos that had me looking forward to every Wednesday morning (on account of the time difference) where Trickshot’s staff would set the guys up with treasure hunts for their fans’ entertainment.

  It was like nothing I had ever watched or experienced before.

  And that’s when Jaeyong finally caught my eye, when I learned that he was a foreign member, Korean-Canadian, and didn’t speak Korean as naturally as the others, who were all born in South Korea and therefore native speakers.

  Jaeyong would fumble his words, and I remember freezing when he swore in Québécois French, the words tumbling out of him, muffling his mic so the editors wouldn’t catch the words and erroneously translate them for their international fans.

  My scalp tingled and I felt a little sick, pausing the video at the close-up of Jaeyong’s face, scrutinizing it until I could see the boy I once knew, hidden in the man’s features. I remember feeling a little lost, looking at him, recognizing that smile that used to belong to me and me alone, now for all the fans watching their streams, Jaeyong looking more and more familiar in that disembodied way the longer I looked at him.

  And like the total fangirl I’d become, I looked him up, the group’s bio, each member’s bio, until it was confirmed. Min Jaeyong was my Lucas Min from a thousand years ago, the friend I mourned when he moved away after the summer before the ninth grade, crying into my pillow more nights than I could count at how much I missed him.

  How much I kept missing him.

  He was here, in Seoul—becoming a trainee at Hana Entertainment at the age of fourteen, putting his dancing chops to the test, learning how to sing, and becoming one of the visuals (the most good-looking member) of the group, enticing more female fans to watch them with his good looks and insane dancing talent.

  It was almost like getting my friend back, poring over all of their online content, learning as much as I could about the band, about Jaeyong, what he had been up to all this time when we were apart, what he was willing to tell the cameras over the last fifteen(ish) years of how he got to where he was, what he was doing while he moved away, and it became clear that he probably forgot all about me.