21. Chapter 21
“Is this one of those… what do you call it, Nicky? A midlife crisis?”
“Hong Namgyu, why are you stupid?”
“Ari’s not old enough for a midlife crisis,” said Kei, imbuing his voice with levels of patience you’d typically reserve for toddlers and kittens. “It’s more like a quarter life crisis.”
“I’m not having a quarter life crisis,” Eunjae argued, in vain. Not even Jungwoo paid him any attention. He was still focused on the spot over Eunjae”s shoulder where Jiyeon had been just a few seconds ago, before she pulled the glass door shut behind her.
Kazu yawned. “It’s really goddamn early here,” he complained, joining the call from his hotel room in Paris. He went every year for the Vuitton show, since he was an ambassador for the brand. “What’s going on now, kid? Hurry up so I can sleep for another hour.”
“God, can you put some clothes on?”
“Yeah, why’s Zuzu always naked?” Jesse demanded.
“Naked? I have pants on! And underwear!”
“Oh, wait,” said Kei, rolling his eyes. “Let me just give you an award for that.”
Namgyu gave a wistful sigh. “Aww! I wish we could all have awards for putting our clothes on. Life would be so much happier.”
“Jungwoo-yah, where’s Max?”
“Taking a nap. He said he already told Ari what to do and there’s nothing else to discuss.”
“He wants you to fake your own death, doesn’t he?”
Eunjae nodded at Nick, who nodded sagely back.
“Ari-hyung,” Jesse wailed again, “you’re over there with a girl though? Like, you abandoned us for romance?”
Namgyu’s smile wobbled. Nick watched Eunjae’s face on the screen and so did Jungwoo. Kazu just snorted.
“Oh, well. If that’s the special announcement then I’m going back to sleep. Good luck, Romeo.”
“Wait,” said Eunjae to all six of them. “I need your help.”
“How are we supposed to help you, hyung? We’re all in jail.”
“Kazu’s not in jail.”
“Kazu’s not in this jail,” said Kei, darkly, “but he’s still in jail.”
“I bet jail is worse when you can see the Eiffel Tower from your window. And he had to go with Doyoung.”
This cued a collective groan about their least favorite manager. But then Jesse cried out, “What do you even need us for? You have a girl now.”
“Jesse, whine about that one more time and I”m not buying you anything you wanted from Paris.”
“What? But I”m out of the really good cold cream!”
“Who still uses cold cream?”
“My granny! I love her!”
“Why can’t you moisturize like a normal person?”
“I have unique skin care needs! You wouldn’t understand!”
Eunjae telegraphed some desperate hand signals to Jungwoo, who obligingly used his host privileges to mute everyone. Able to hear himself think at last, Eunjae said, “The founders — does anyone know how to reach them?”
The screen became a checkerboard of frowning faces and furrowed brows. Nick replied, “I doubt anyone knows how to find them except Mr. Yoon. Remember when we were filming for Netflix? We didn’t even see the founders then.”
“Don’t they have offices on one of the top floors at Emerald?”
Kei clicked a button that somehow filled his backdrop with giant letters spelling the word NO. “That’s just a rumor. I mean, who’s even been up there? Unless…” He switched to Japanese. “Grandpa, what about you? You’ve been alive for like a hundred years. Share your knowledge.”
“First of all, shut up,” Kazu shot back, also in Japanese, “and second of all, no. Whenever the big bosses wanted to see us back then, they just came to wherever we were. Nowadays they send all their orders through Yoon.”
Eunjae blew out a frustrated breath. “Surely they have company email addresses at least. How can there be no way to contact them?”
“But why do you even want to contact them?” asked Jungwoo. The steadiness of his gaze felt like a drill piercing Eunjae’s skull. “You just needed to get away for a while. That’s not something they’d bother to tell Haewon and Soyeon.”
“There’s nothing wrong with needing a break, Ari. You’re not the first and you won’t be the last. They can’t really be too mad at you.” Namgyu tugged on a loose thread unraveling from the cuff of his sweater. “I think we’re allowed to take breaks sometimes…?”
“It’s the running-away-and-hiding part that they’re mad about. And what I’m mad about is that Ari-hyung is out there living an actual rom-com while I’m stuck here, wasting away —”
“Jesse, I swear —”
Eunjae hastened to end the call before any death threats could be delivered. “Okay, okay. Don’t fight.” He propped the phone against his half empty water bottle and bowed at the screen. “And I’m sorry for causing so much trouble for everyone, I really am.”
Jungwoo waved his apology away. He offered Eunjae a wan smile. “Stay safe and get some rest, Ari. You can just buy us dinner when this is over.”
“Yeah! Oh my gosh, dinner! Real dinner!”
“I’m so tired of eating everything out of a bowl!”
“Ari won’t make us split everything five ways like Zuzu.”
“I don’t see what’s wrong with trying to save money. Take a hot second to count how many mouths I have to feed.”
“Shut up, hyung! You sleep on a bunch of gold bars!”
“It’s so unfair, you have sooooo much money —”
Eunjae watched his brothers sign off one by one until only Kazu was left. “Don’t go yet,” his brother said, wrangling his inky, shoulder length hair into a low ponytail which, of course, looked both effortless and elegant at the same time. Bedhead, but luxe.
“Did you get to see your family? I know you mentioned they’d be in Paris the same week.”
“Hell no. I’m here with Doyoung, remember? You know how he is. Of course the one manager we all hate is the one who will never quit. He wouldn’t let me leave the hotel except for Vuitton events the whole time I was here. Yoon’s orders, he’d say. That guy’s so far up Yoon’s ass that he hasn’t seen the sun in about three years.” Kazu went rummaging around in his luggage for a shirt. “And if you’re wondering, my aunt has threatened to buy out his contract with Emerald so she can fire him herself.”
“I was wondering,” admitted Eunjae, which made Kazu chuckle. “I’m sorry, Zu. We hardly ever get to be with family and I ruined that for you.”
“Don’t worry about that. I talk to them every day. Worry about this instead: Yoon’s getting pretty pissed that they haven’t found you. I heard Doyoung on the phone earlier when he thought I was asleep.”
“Ah.”
“You got the email I sent?”
“Yeah.” Eunjae sighed. “Your contract says the same thing mine does.”
Kazu nodded at this. “I figured as much. We’re all under the same terms.”
“There’s this one part that really bothers me, but maybe I’m reading it wrong. And surely Jungwoo’s would be different. All the music he’s written… and what about the rap lyrics? Nicky writes his own and so does Max, as of last year. I need to talk to the founders. This just doesn’t make sense.”
Checking that Doyoung wasn’t lurking behind him, Kazu said, “Ari, don”t trust them to play fair. Don’t expect them to listen to us. Not Yoon, not the founders, not anybody. This is their game, not ours. I know you want to settle this without a fight, but that might not be possible. It’s just not the same anymore, at Emerald. In the beginning, when it was me and Hwannie here and most of you hadn’t even been recruited yet, I’d never have thought it could be like this.”
“They care about us, don’t they? They used to. I thought they did.”
Kazu shook his head, at a loss. “I guess we’ll find out soon enough.”