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hyojungss. this is a self fill because i'm a loser. character study.date posted: 2024-12-26
summary: Lily and her voice and the stage.
word count: 461 words
notes: for the 2023 comment ficathon by hyojungss. this is a self fill because i'm a loser. character study.
They ask Haewon, since she had her hair cut, "who did you break up with?", and Lily wonders if the girl had ever known what love is until she met Bae.
She's happy for them - as much as they dance around each other, as much as they have to because of their line of work, they at least are paired enough together, by fans and subsequently management, that they have time together.
Lily thinks of herself and her relationships like the sea and its boats: it's tenuous, but steady. They coexist, and eventually, people get to where they need to be, while she stays in place.
It wasn't always this way, she knows - it's new, brought on by her debut. Before her debut, she was anything but a constant, always in flux, never stable. She never had time for many relationships, always moving, always shifting, always going from one training session to the next. It was always compliments on her voice, never her, never anything else about her, never something romantic like her eyes or even something ugly and mean like the way she rambles and rambles and puts her foot in her mouth.
Ultimately, they're right, she knows: the stage is what she's meant for. Her voice is all she is.
She was brought out in front of cameras and microphones occasionally, shown off like a circus animal being told to do tricks. She sang Roar in a Disney knit sweater and then she was dancing to Finesse in a crop top and blazer. It's been too fast and too long all at once.
Lily stands with Sullyoon and Jiwoo and all of NMIXX at stage left, sees their manager beckon them to walk forward and so they all move and wave at the cameras. The bobby pins keeping her hood in place prick at her hair as she turns her head to face every camera. She keeps moving until she finds herself behind the glowing line at the front of the stage, lights dim, crowd waiting, anticipating.
The in-ear monitor starts the metronome, click click click through her head, melting into the rising music. She moves to the middle, pulls her microphone closer to her face, and looks up.
Lily never thinks when she performs: she does. So instead of thinking, she smiles, bright, brighter than the stage lights on her, illuminating the dust on the floor that she briefly glances at as she's moving her feet. Later, she'd think about how Haewon would chastise herself for taking a moment to glance away like that instead of staying focused.
But she's not Haewon, she's Lily, and the one thing she allows herself to think about, briefly, as she performs her opening lines, is how alive she feels right now.