Dawn Is Blue
The first original song from Spirit 23rd generation. The untitled track, with Hana serving as the main producer and composer, was now nearing the end of its rehearsal phase. All the technical issues had been ironed out. None of the members were still staring at sheet music while playing. They had talked about revising some of the lyrics, but since a few parts remained undecided, there were still sections where Juyeon simply hummed them with a nasal tone and moved on. Today, as the final step, they needed to fill in those blanks. They also had to come up with a title for the song they would introduce to the public.
This was Suhyun’s second time at the café today. Seoeun began a rapid-fire Q&A session aimed at the two lyricists, Suhyun and Juyeon.
“Did you write these lyrics with a specific situation or background in mind?”
“Um… we just wrote them while complaining together in Juyeon’s room…”
“Hey. Wait a second. Lee Suhyun. You were alone in a room with Juyeon?”
Yoon Hana. Shocked! She had been gulping down her drink and now broke into a dry cough.
“N-no?” Before Suhyun could even answer, Juyeon cut off the controversy with surgical precision. If this fact got out, forget about broadcasting—the other members would bombard them with guilt trips. Juyeon, how could you do that with Suhyun before us… Just imagining Seoeun teasing her made Juyeon’s remaining first semester feel like it would be nothing but days of suffering. It might even drag into the second semester! Juyeon knew all too well that Seoeun was surprisingly narrow-minded.
“So what Suhyun meant was that he imagined the song’s narrator sitting alone in a room and wrote it from that perspective.” Juyeon corrected his words as if she were an official interpreter.
“…Is that right?” Hana jerked her chin toward Suhyun as if seeking confirmation.
“Yeah. Why would I go to Juyeon’s place for no reason…” Suhyun successfully defended the secret of his loner comrade. A single cold sweat trickled down his spine.
Feeling awkward, Suhyun picked up his pen and began scribbling in earnest.
“I was thinking this has the vibe of… someone who just had a reality check… writing it at dawn…”
“So it’s that cringy middle-school syndrome emotion?”
“Hana. Can you phrase that a little nicer?” Both Suhyun and Juyeon were the type who shriveled up if you crushed their confidence.
“Then it would be good to weave that background into the final chorus.”
Lee Seoeun, Korean Education major. Working hard again today. Seoeun hummed along to the melody and offered the pair a variety of options.
“Dawn. The time of day called dawn has quite a charming background, doesn’t it?”
“It gives the feeling of a new beginning as the sun rises, and it’s the hour when everyone else is asleep.”
“It actually appears often in literary works with all kinds of metaphorical expressions.”
“Isn’t there something you can only feel at dawn?”
Watching Seoeun work so diligently, both Suhyun and Juyeon felt the atmosphere demanded they say something—anything.
“I don’t know if this will help, but…” Suhyun shared an experience of his own.
“Speak comfortably, Suhyun. This isn’t an exam.”
“So… back when I lived at my parents’ house, I once stayed up all night and opened the window at dawn?”
Seoeun’s eyes sparkled. She expected some cool story that would spark inspiration.
“And then?”
“I went out to the veranda, leaned on the railing like this…”
Juyeon and Hana both perked up their ears and listened intently.
“…The wind felt cool.”
Juyeon let out a small snort of laughter while Hana stared at him as if he were hopeless. Seoeun, completely drained, pressed a hand to her forehead and took a long sip of her drink instead of answering.
“…I see.”
Well… the wind can feel cool… Dawn breeze is nice, right…?
“If that’s the case, I have something too.” Juyeon stepped up with a solemn expression to provide backup fire.
“Oh! What is it, Juyeon?”
“The sky was blue!”
At this point Seoeun seriously felt like she had come for student teaching practice. No, even middle schoolers would probably do better than this… Still, since they had offered their own opinions, Seoeun jotted down a short note.
[The wind is cool]
[The sky is blue]
Yeah. Let’s just put these in and I’ll handle the rest myself.
The chorus that Seoeun had already revised once looked like this:
[Spring that hasn’t come yet]
[On blurry days]
[The night that quietly falls asleep again]
[I wait for tomorrow’s you]
[Like a single flower]
[That time when it will bloom clearly]
She tried substituting new lines while keeping the same structure. Seoeun, who scored 97 on the Korean Language section of the CSAT, tended to hypnotize herself whenever she attempted creative writing—even though CSAT scores had nothing to do with lyric writing.
[Opening the window and facing]
[That dawn is blue]
[A cool breeze blows in]
Seoeun counted the syllables with her mouth moving like babbling and tilted her notebook toward them.
“How about something like this?”
“Whoa… Unnie, that’s amazing? You turned it into that?”
A sincere exclamation burst from Hana. Was this what they meant by turning crap into rice cakes?
“Noona, you’re incredible…”
“Unnie, sugoi…”
Even to the loner party, Seoeun looked like a wizard.
“But then the latter part stays the same?”
“Of course not. We should add a little variation there too.”
[I wait for tomorrow’s me]
Both the first and second verses had said “I wait for you.” For the finale, Seoeun changed the key word from “you” to “me” as a highlight. In Korean, the position of a single dot between “you” and “me” could create all kinds of magical shifts in meaning.
She needed one line to replace “Like a single flower.” Something to go in place of a flower. Sun, star, moon, fire, water, night, snow. Snow… “Like a single snowflake” sounded pretty good. Seoeun closed both eyes. In her imagination she stood on a veranda at 4 a.m. on a winter day with the wind blowing. White breath flowed from her lips in the cold air, and faint snowflakes that were about to disappear lingered above the railing.
“Decision!”
—Scribble scribble scribble
[I wait for tomorrow’s me]
[Like a single snowflake]
[Even if it melts and disappears]
Seoeun presented her final draft to the members. What came back were three thumbs-up. None of them could come up with anything better than her.
“Then all that’s left is deciding the title?”
Hana, arms crossed, read through the entire lyrics from the beginning.
“Suhyun and Juyeon, you two decide.”
The two loners looked at each other. The moment their eyes met, they could read exactly what the other wanted to say.
‘You pick.’
‘You’re the one who led this. You do it.’
Since running parallel lines would never end, Seoeun asked each of them to write down one candidate.
Juyeon preferred a one-word title. It was intuitive and simple. She also thought it matched current trends in popular music. Titles that went “Something something happened” were way past their expiration date. After much deliberation, the result was [Reality Check].
However, the one who got hit with a reality check upon seeing it was Hana. They had created such a cool sound… and the lyrics seemed beautifully written too, but this was just…
“Hey… Park Juyeon… I worked my ass off on this song and the title is Reality Check…?”
“…Sorry.”
“No… isn’t that too much! Seriously…”
It seemed she had lacked consideration for the composer. On the other hand, Suhyun really liked the final lyrics Seoeun had completed. Probably because it was based on his own experience, he could clearly picture the scene.
“How about ‘Dawn Is Blue’?”
“Dawn Is Blue?”
Seoeun, who had been pondering along with them, rolled the words on her tongue. [Dawn Is Blue] sounded quite good. If you added a spoonful of exaggeration, it was the kind of title that could even make you imagine the album cover.
“I like it.”
Perhaps because the aftermath of Reality Check had been so strong, Hana readily gave the okay as if this level was acceptable.
“I… think it’s good too.”
Even the previously shrinking Juyeon agreed.
If the president gave her permission, today’s mission would be completely cleared.
“Mmm… okay. Let’s go with this as the working title for now. But if something better comes to mind, don’t hesitate and just say it comfortably. All of you.”
The meeting ended. Seoeun decided to send Choi Kang a separate message.
“Everyone heading home now?”
“Guess so.”
“Yeah.”
“Ah… I have to do laundry.”
Since they all either lived near campus or not too far away, they ended up taking the same bus.
“See you! See you Monday!”
After Seoeun waved and disappeared, Suhyun tried to head home with Juyeon.
“Lee Suhyun.”
Hana grabbed the hem of his shirt.
“Yeah?”
“Stay for a bit and talk to me before you go.”
Juyeon, who had stopped, stared quietly at the two of them.
“Will it take long?”
Suhyun glanced at Juyeon’s expression before asking Hana.
“Um… a little. Juyeon, you go first. I have something to say to him.”
“Okay. Take care, Hana.”
Once Juyeon disappeared into the alley carrying her paper bag, Hana began rummaging through her own bag.
“Ugh. Where did it go?”
“What’s wrong?”
If needed, Suhyun was ready to help.
“Ah! Here it is!”
Inside a thin plastic wrapper, a delicate chain necklace sparkled beautifully. Hanging from the chain was a slender silver ring. Hana placed the necklace in Suhyun’s hand.
“This. It goes really well with the clothes I picked out for you today. So wear it on stage too.”
A gift? Hana is giving me a present? Suhyun couldn’t take his eyes off the necklace.
“What? You don’t like it?”
“No? No, but… are you just giving this to me…?”
Unaccustomed to favors, Suhyun needed to know the reason.
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Because I figured you wouldn’t like spending money on stuff like this.”
It wasn’t that he disliked it so much as he found it unnecessary… Anyway, if she had just said it suited him back at the store, they could have bought it together.
“Give it here.”
Hana took the necklace back, tore open the packaging.
“Come here.”
It wasn’t what people called an exciting height difference. Suhyun wasn’t particularly tall, and Hana was quite tall for a girl. Hana, having opened the clasp, wrapped both arms around his neck. The distance between them closed. A sweet spring scent wafted from Hana.
To a third party, the two of them would look unmistakably like a couple. Hana’s eyes were fixed on the necklace, but in Suhyun’s eyes there was only Hana’s face.
Hana… gave me a present…
“Ah. Done!”
Hana stepped back and scanned him as if appraising her work. She thought she had chosen well. Ha. Yoon Hana. You nailed it. The necklace perfectly filled in the two-percent part of Suhyun’s outfit that had felt lacking.
“Do you like it?”
Watching Suhyun’s face turn bright red, Hana felt a thrilling sense of satisfaction.