Assistant Manager Kim Hates Idols

Although the group name issue was still unresolved, other preparations were steadily progressing.

 

Today’s profile photo shoot was part of that process.

 

For this day, I had to go to bed at 1 a.m. for a whole week.

 

It was because Jeong Seongbin, following the manager’s instructions, strictly prohibited late-night work citing ‘skin condition management for all members’.

 

‘Um, Seongbin. This research for reference materials might take some time…’

 

‘We’ll take care of breakfast ourselves this week, so just go to bed and finish it tomorrow morning.’

 

I wasn’t the only one under Seongbin’s special care.

 

‘Seongbin hyung, I swear, I just need to finish one more line of this melody, and then I can sleep peacefully!’

 

‘You said the same thing an hour ago. Cheonghyeon, you should go to bed too.’

 

I had to admit. I was a bit overwhelmed by the resolve of Jeong Seongbin, who was still a high school student. There was no room for compromise.

 

Thanks to sufficient and regular sleep, newfound youth, and the skills of professional makeup artists, my dark circles completely disappeared.

 

It was so impressive that even Choi Jeho gave a backhanded compliment.

 

“You shouldn’t pull all-nighters. You look better without dark circles.”

 

“Don’t ever say that in front of Seongbin.”

 

While I’d rather avoid overtime, it was better than falling behind on work. Accumulated tasks tended to cause headaches.

 

“Oh, when I see you in a shirt instead of your usual practice clothes, you look much more handsome.”

 

“Really? Should I take a selfie?”

 

Amidst the chaos, the Manager and Lee Cheonghyeon were chatting excitedly.

 

It would be nice if they could keep their fun conversations to themselves, but Cheonghyeon ran all the way to where we were.

 

“Hey! The manager says we look good in shirts! Let’s take a picture together!”

 

“Yeah, yeah. Go take a hundred pictures by yourself first.”

 

“Hmph, why? Let’s take one together!”

 

“You shouldn’t be asking to take pictures with others right now, you should be thinking about preserving your own face.”

 

Cheonghyeon’s face was a shock when I first saw it.

 

However, it was natural that the impact from someone’s face subsided and you got used to it when living together.

 

I, too, had gotten used to Cheonghyeon’s face… or so I thought.

 

A well-groomed handsome man was completely different from his bare face.

 

Now I understood why fans were so passionate about having all three elements—hair, makeup, and outfit—perfectly balanced.

 

“No way! Do I look that good? How much, specifically?”

 

“About 850,000 won per unit?”

 

“Why 850,000 won?”

 

“That’s the current price of gold.”

 

“I accept your evaluation, hyungnim.”

 

Lee Cheonghyeon gave a thumb-up with a touched expression.

 

Over Cheonghyeon’s shoulder, I could see the video team’s camera lens pointing this way. I should ask them to edit out the scene just now.

 

As I barely managed to escape Cheonghyeon’s reach by saying we should sit down to avoid getting in the way since there were so many people, I spotted Jeong Seongbin.

 

‘Hair’s done. Makeup’s done too.’

 

He seemed ready, so I turned to check on the other guys, but then I noticed the tie in Seongbin’s hand.

 

Our profile photo concept was ‘neat student ID’.

 

It was surprisingly hard to find a decent, clean front-facing photo of an idol. Especially in a neat outfit.

 

I remembered how the fans used to photoshop school uniforms and suits onto Spark’s faces.

 

We could always take conceptual photos during activities,

 

But a youthful ID photo could only be taken now.

 

So we chose white shirts and gray ties. It was the most basic and clean look.

 

‘But if he’s holding that…’

 

I pointed at Seongbin’s tie and asked.

 

“Do you know how to tie a tie?”

 

“No, our school uniform had clip-on ties.”

 

As expected. Now that I thought about it, I didn’t know how to tie a tie in high school either.

 

Looking around, the two stylists seemed to be struggling to take care of all six of us.

 

It would be inconsiderate to ask for help tying a tie in this chaos.

 

“Come here. I’ll tie it for you.”

 

“You know how to tie a tie, hyung?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

I had never tied someone else’s tie before though.

 

Maybe because I used to tie it while half-asleep every morning, it wasn’t difficult to do it for someone else.

 

I shaped it nicely and patted Seongbin’s shoulder.

 

“All done. If you want, you can learn how to do it later. It’s not hard.”

 

“Yes, thank you!”

 

“Hyung, me too…”

 

Next to Seongbin who was brightly thanking me, Park Joowoo shyly held out his tie with both hands. His politeness made it impossible to refuse.

 

I made a mental note to request clip-on ties in the handover report once we received our payments.

 

With visions of a distant future in mind, I carefully tied Park Joowoo’s tie as well.

 

The photoshoot went smoother than I expected.

 

Starting with Choi Jeho, who seemed to have gotten used to the camera after filming a music video once.

 

Jeong Seongbin, who had been through three years of camera tests in school.

 

Lee Cheonghyeon, who had adapted quickly to cameras even in his early debut days.

 

And Park Joowoo, who maintained a calm demeanor whether there was a camera or not.

 

As for me… Well, I’d mastered the art of smiling without looking fake, so I passed both the expressionless and smiling photos on the first try.

 

‘The real challenge is getting Kang Kiyeon through this.’

 

The five trainees, including me, watched breathlessly as Kang Kiyeon walked into the set last.

 

We were ready to jump in and tickle him if necessary.

 

That was likely to happen.

 

“Smile a little more! Yes, that’s it, looks natural!”

 

Kang Kiyeon was smiling, faintly but definitely.

 

It was hard to believe this was the same guy whose expression during his birthday vlog while looking at the cake became the meme ‘a mafia boss overseeing an execution’.

 

“Do you practice smiling at night?”

 

“No, it’s the result of self-study.”

 

‘Smiling beautifully’ was actually pretty difficult.

 

A natural bright smile could make viewers happy too, but idols had to be conscious of how they looked even when smiling.

 

If it looked even slightly awkward, they became targets of criticism for having a forced smile.

 

But they couldn’t just smile all the time either. If the smiling face didn’t match the public’s beauty standards, it could lead to malicious screenshots and hateful comments.

 

Though not comparable to idols, I could relate to them, having been scolded for my eye corners twitching when I smiled and said ‘Enjoy your lunch’ to Manager Nam.

 

But back then my eyes were just malfunctioning because I worked so hard and couldn’t even drink water.

 

Anyway.

 

It was surprising to see Kang Kiyeon, who was the most stiff among us, especially in front of a camera, smiling so openly.

 

We stared at the monitor, watching intently, and then surrounded Kang Kiyeon as he returned after successfully completing the shoot.

 

“Kiyeon, the pictures turned out great!”

 

“They looked really good.”

 

“Come on, it’s just taking one photo…”

 

If it were Cheonghyeon or me, he would have brushed us off with a ‘whatever, go away’, but he was visibly flustered by Seongbin and Joowoo’s compliments. It was a bit annoying.

 

“I heard that when you go out into society, there aren’t many people who will compliment you. So let’s enjoy this while it lasts, Kang Kiyeon!”

 

“Who said that?”

 

“Iwol hyung.”

 

“From what I see, I think hyung is living his second life. His thoughts are so worldly.”

 

“If you two don’t want to receive manner lessons from this wordly hyung, you two better cut it out.”

 

Being worldly aside, I was curious. How did this stiff guy suddenly learn to smile like an idol?

 

The answer was simple.

 

“I practiced.”

 

“When?”

 

“Just… whenever there was a mirror around.”

 

Indeed, an attitude that would impress even a drill instructor.

 

The saying ‘effort never betrays you’ was absolutely true.

 

Unexpectedly, I felt most uncomfortable when taking group photos.

 

I experienced cognitive dissonance at the fact that I had to be among these five people.

 

The image of Spark walking the red carpet at the year-end awards ceremony was still vivid in my mind.

 

I thought I had prepared myself for the inevitable comparisons when I decided to debut with these kids by holding onto their ankles.

 

But trying to take a photo with these shining faces, I felt my own face dimming.

 

To prepare for this, I had suggested a specific composition when proposing the profile photo concept. It was a composition where I stood at the very end.

 

This way, they could easily crop me out if I left the group later.

 

I resolved to stand at the edge as much as possible in group photos from now on.

 

‘I should make a 5-member version in photoshop later and back it up separately.’

 

With a new task in mind, the profile shoot ended successfully.

 

How should I say this? It was a very strange feeling.

 

* * *

 

“Now that we’ve taken the photos, doesn’t it really feel like we’re about to debut? I was so excited last night that I couldn’t even sleep.”

 

“You need to sleep. That’s how you grow taller.”

 

“Look at this hyung ruining the mood again.”

 

Lee Cheonghyeon recovered so quickly that it was hard to believe he had once run away due to pressure.

 

He was chattering non-stop while eating watermelon with one hand and solving English worksheets with the other.

 

I looked at today’s workbook in front of me and thought.

 

‘At this age, doing worksheets—if that doesn’t make it all feel real, I don’t know what will, you brat.’

 

I was deeply moved to be solving private education worksheets at this age, which I couldn’t afford as a teenager.

 

“Cheonghyeon, let’s focus during the time we agreed to use for study, okay?”

 

“I knew someone would say something.”

 

After being chided by both Seongbin and Kiyeon, Cheonghyeon finally quieted down and started on his own homework.

 

In line with global trends, idol groups usually had at least one or two members responsible for foreign languages. 

 

Moreover, when it came to English, everyone was expected to know at least basic greetings.

 

That was why we were gathered in the living room of our dorm at 10:30 PM, solving English worksheets.

 

Since we couldn’t cut back much on practice time, we had a one-on-one session with a tutor once a week, and on other days, we had to complete the assigned homework.

 

Honestly, it wasn’t that difficult. I had prepared for the TOEIC Speaking exam up until I was job hunting, after all.

 

But my heart was a different matter.

 

After 12 years of studying what others told me to, and 4 years of studying stuff that didn’t suit me, I finally escaped, only to be dragged back to the desk. It was killing me.

 

I did recognize the necessity of studying. The only English phrases I could remember were all business-related.

 

If an idol said ‘Thank you for taking the time to attend’ to overseas fans in the live broadcast.

 

I didn’t know for sure, but it would certainly come across as strange, to say the least.

 

Still, I couldn’t complain. Even Cheonghyeon, who could converse freely in English, had joined us in the living room to study music theory under the pretext of studying with the members.

 

Thanks to that, Cheonghyun was using his excellent English skills to become a personal tutor for the studious Jeong Seongbin.

 

“Lee Cheonghyeon, when did you learn English?”

 

Choi Jeho, seemingly having lost concentration, put down his mechanical pencil and asked. I was wondering how long he’d last.

 

“This is all the skill I honed at English kindergarten.”

 

“Can you really speak fluently just from attending an English kindergarten?”

 

“There was compulsory education after that, hyung.”

 

Lee Cheonghyeon said with a smile that looked like it had been burned pure white.

 

There was no need to explain the frustration that came with it. It was clear enough.

 

“Iwol hyung… Aren’t you able to converse fully too?”

 

“I can only respond to things I know.  I’ve been injected with too many scripts.”

 

“But you were pretty precise when you asked for a receipt.”

 

“You guys, you should definitely memorize that. Proof of expenditure is essential when you spend money. Got it?”

 

As soon as I said that, I remembered employees who’d pleaded about not getting receipts when applying for dinner expenses and transportation costs.

 

Or they’d submit just the receipt without noting the account number, or the claimed amount would be incorrect…

 

‘Thinking about this too much is bad for mental health.’

 

I should probably learn some kind of peaceful meditation technique soon. My mind and body were too worn out.