going to minsoo on friday seems like an appointment with a therapist, what with all of the mental stress meiqi has been feeling. she doesn’t intend to unload everything on her mind to the coach, but it ends up happening that way anyways as soon as he asks the first question (which, to be fair, really does remind her of an american movie therapist).
“how was your week?”
meiqi doesn’t hesitate to let out a whine. “terrible!” the coach laughs, but she can’t tell if it’s out of sympathy or because he agrees after spending hours listening to her mumbling trash. it’s probably both. “i can’t rap for shit—oh my god, wait, can we start over again? can i re-walk in? I didn’t mean to let that slip.”
how stupid of you, meiqi, she scolds herself, pinching the skin of her wrist as her hands are in her lap. she just keeps messing up this week, whether it’s while practicing or watching her words because of the cameras that catch her every move. the whole situation is stressful, and definitely harder than she expected. meiqi has to keep reminding herself that this isn’t forever, and that when she actually debuts, there won’t be cameras in her dorm to capture every possible mistake for netizens to pick apart.
taking a deep breath, she starts over. “it’s really hard, rapping i mean. i was definitely not made for this, even if i did pick such an easy song. i thought it would be easier, but there’s a lot of pressure… i don’t know why everyone has to rap or sing. singers shouldn’t have to rap, and vice versa, if they can’t, you know? ah... i went to jongin for help because he’s like the god of rap in nova. i’m a little biased when saying that though because out of everyone, i’ve known him the longest. but at the same time as i was grateful for his help, i was also immensely intimidated because he’s so good and i can’t even go one line without mispronouncing a word or something… coach, i’m dying, please help me.” meiqi says the last sentence cutely, but it’s definitely far from a joke. “i’m so nervous…”
week two is perhaps the most stressful seven days meiqi has ever experienced. minus that one time her cousin was in the hospital, and that time she failed her first ever audition, and when she—okay, so maybe it’s not the worst, but it’s definitely in the top ten, because the extent of meiqi’s rapping skills is her ability to follow along with a drake song which, even then, is more of a monotonous way of singing rather than showcasing actual skills. how the fuck is she supposed to manage one stanza, let alone a whole performance?
it’s the second day of the week and she still hasn’t even decided on a song. frankly speaking, meiqi doesn’t think she can keep up with the likes of the hip hop artists whose music she enjoys. she needs a second opinion if she doesn’t want to be eliminated from the sn project due to incompetence.
meiqi finds herself in front of hugo. oh, her trusted hugo. he’s her only hope. “hey, hugo. my friend. my creative soulmate. you know, i don’t think i’ve ever told you how nice your hair looks? or how well of a rapper you are? or... i don’t know, how sweet it is that you’re always willing to help your friends?”
⭐️ — sn project: month one, week two — ⭐️
now playing: 21st century girls by bts
there are so many songs—chinese, korean, and english alike—that contain raps. of course, meiqi can’t go with one of the english songs because they’re full of swears. no one would understand if she went with a chinese song. really, her only option is a kpop song.
(if she had the choice, she wouldn’t pick any song. week two of the nova project shouldn’t be a thing).
21st century girl is what she ultimately decides on for her second week’s evaluation. her reasoning for her choice goes like this:
1. an upbeat song will allow her to hide her terrible rapping behind a charismatic facade which, in turn, will make her performance seem better than it really is;
2. the raps are fairly slow and straightforward, so with enough practice, she should be able to follow along adequately enough; and
3. it’s been two days since the challenge was proposed and she has to perform by the end of the week, so meiqi is downright panicking at this point.
to put it bluntly, meiqi is fucked.
she doesn’t know why non-rappers even need to show their skills. it’s stupid and a waste of time because the company already knows they can’t do it. a dancer and a vocalist shouldn’t even need to be able to rap, and it should simply be considered an asset. fuck hyun bin. fuck nova. fuck everything.
it’s only been one hour since she started practicing, but meiqi already wants to give up. the members of bts make it seem so easy when she listens to them, so why can’t she grasp a couple lines of rap?
frustrated, she tosses the sheets of paper, with lyrics neatly typed out and notes in the margins scrawled like chicken scratch, in the air and watches them float down to the floor. the private training room feels like it’s closing in on her, or maybe that’s just her eyes drooping. sleep is still sparse and fleeting; maybe that’s why she feels more on edge than usual.
meiqi stares blankly at the papers scattered across the room, sighs, and then bends down to sweep them up.
* * *
hugo is a lifesaver.
meiqi knows that he has his own performance to perfect, but she goes to him anyways. he’s better off than her, she thinks, and so he can spare a few minutes of his schedule to help her as a friend. right?
he’s also the only rapper that meiqi actually knows well enough to throw her ego out the window and ask for help (other than minsoo, but the last time she checked in with him, he looked like she had just given him a puppy and murdered it in the same breath).
she offers him one of her snacks, the ones that she hides in the bathroom vent, as if it’s a drug deal: looking nonchalant and slipping it to him behind her back so that no one catches the exchange, even though the cameras film the trade anyways.
* * *
meiqi forgets the lyrics. she literally forgets half of the third rap verse the minute she steps in front of the coaches, and all throughout her introduction, she racks her brain for any little thing that she can remember.
it doesn’t work.
the song starts, and meiqi already has lost all of the barely-there confidence she had after practicing with hugo, minsoo, and youtube.
the first few lines are easy because they’re in english, and meiqi much prefers that over korean. but it switches quickly and she’s barely able to keep up with j-hope. she makes it through the first half of the song, but not without a few stumbles and an awkward flow.
suga’s verse is the problem. meiqi runs out of breath because she’s technically doing two people’s parts, and on top of that, now she’s forgotten the lyrics.
so she mumbles. she makes up words as she goes, her entire demeanor changing as her shoulders hunch and she tries to disappear into thin air because holy fucking hell this is so fucking embarrassing.
meiqi only knows the english part for that verse, thus she can end it better than how she started. but there’s still the last bit of the edited version of the song where she sings the closing. it feels like the longest 30-or-so seconds of her life, but she finishes with that before she bows uncomfortably and hurries out of the room. tears are already staining her cheeks as she exits into the hallway.
meiqi doesn’t talk to any of her roommates for the rest of the day. she takes one of her crisps bags from the bathroom vent and buries herself under her blanket. the sound of sniffles and crinkles and crunching are all her roommates are met with when they step into the dim room.
