What It Means to Be a Fan
“Ah… right. The colors… they're the colors of the outfits I wore on stage.”
It seemed the painter himself had only just realized why he'd chosen those colors.
When I let out a small laugh, Singer Kang Sehyun eyed me with suspicion.
“Hold on… am I the weird one here? Or is it you?”
“Me?”
“Yeah. Your friend thing was just an excuse, wasn't it? Turns out you're actually our fan.”
“I am a fan. That's why I got your autograph back then, remember?”
“No, I mean…”
Singer Kang Sehyun scratched his head, then shook it. “I don't get you. You're a really strange kid.”
Unfortunately, the words had zero effect on me.
I started walking without any particular reaction, and he trailed along at my heels like a duckling.
“How many of our videos have you watched? How much of our music do you know?”
“Hmm. Everything except the deep album cuts, probably. Bihyuk told me I had to memorize all your songs in advance.”
“Bihyuk?”
“Yes, the name of a friend who's a fan of yours, hyung.”
No need to go as far as giving him the last name.
“Oh, right—you said he's a trainee at our company. I'll have to say hi next time I see him.”
I'd appreciate that. We kept up a loose, rambling conversation as we moved along, and before I knew it, we'd reached the end of the gallery.
“Hello, Injun-hyung. It's been a while.”
“Yes! I mean—hey! Bam—Yeonjae!”
Standing at the entrance was Singer Choi Injun, who appeared to have only just arrived.
The pupils fixed on me wavered awkwardly.
“Hyung, if you're more comfortable speaking formally, that's fine. You can call me Bambi, too.”
With the guilt of snapping at him last time still lingering, I made an extra effort to speak gently.
Which, apparently, only backfired.
“Uhhm…”
Watching Singer Choi Injun avoid my eyes entirely, I swallowed a sigh.
No idea what I'm supposed to do with him.
Jinbae-hyung was still off enjoying the exhibits, and Singer Kang Sehyun had gone off to greet arriving guests. So I sat down on the sofa by the entrance, side by side with Singer Choi Injun. An awkward silence settled over us.
Sensing that anything I did would only fluster him more, I simply stayed quiet.
But the person next to me was visibly squirming with nerves. Please stop shaking your leg.
“…You don't have to keep me company, you know. You could go look around the exhibition.”
“Huh? Ah—no, it's fine. I've already seen all of it anyway.”
It was a signal that he was free to get up if he felt awkward, but apparently the message hadn't landed.
“You mentioned you live together at the dorm. Did you see it then?”
“Sehyun-hyung has a separate studio. He only paints in there. I just wander in whenever I feel like it, like it's my own dining room.”
“I'd heard the two of you were really close, even before this.”
“He's looked after me since the day I first joined the company as a trainee. He's basically an older brother to me. Nags me constantly, too. Just last week—”
For all the bounce in his voice, his eyes still trembled uneasily.
I looked at him, gaze averted, head bowed all the way down.
It's not like I'm going to eat him alive. Why on earth is he like this?
The question was entirely genuine. Should I ask, or shouldn't I?
The drama he was filming with Singer Kang Sehyun had wrapped, so the odds of ever crossing paths with his groupmate again were close to nil.
But there's still Noh Bihyuk.
Whether the guy would even stay in touch with me after debuting was another matter. Still, if he did, there was a chance I'd end up entangled with Choi Injun because of him.
Work in this industry, and you're bound to run into people at least once or twice.
I concluded it was better to just ask outright. So I did.
“Hyung, are you still upset about me snapping at you that time?”
“What? No?! Absolutely not!”
“Then is there something about me you don't like?”
“What are you even saying, Bambi? Nothing like that.”
Whether it was true or not, the man who had been dodging my gaze all this time finally met my eyes straight on.
“I hope I'm wrong, but I get the feeling you're uncomfortable around me. If there's something I need to fix, please just tell me.”
Singer Choi Injun pressed his lips shut.
He looked so much like fog that I couldn't bring myself to say another word.
A long silence followed.
“…Look, Yeonjae. You're right. I don't feel at ease around you.”
Thought so.
The moment I nodded, he rushed to explain himself.
“It's not because you did something wrong or need to fix anything! I don't know where you got that idea, but I wish you'd stop thinking that!”
“Then why can't you relax around me?”
“That's… hah, isn't it obvious? I'm your fan.”
“…?”
I stared back with a face of complete incomprehension.
Reading my expression, he grew even more flustered.
“You don't get what I'm saying?”
“No.”
“When you meet someone you like as a fan, it feels like a dream—you can't believe you're actually talking to them. That doesn't make sense to you?”
I studied his face to see if he was joking, but astonishingly, he wasn't.
“You're being serious right now?”
“Bambi, I'm the one losing my mind here. Have you seriously never liked anything in your whole life?”
“Hmm… I don't know? Not really? Oh—but like I told Sehyun-hyung, I'm a Space fan.”
“No. You're not our fan.”
Singer Choi Injun shook his head with conviction.
That firm, utterly unhesitating answer left me feeling oddly unsettled.
“Why not? I know almost every Space song. I've watched the videos well over a hundred times.”
“That doesn't make you a fan.”
Then what does? Oh—do I have to actually buy the albums?
At the question mark written all over my face, Singer Choi Injun grabbed his head in frustration.
Every blink of his eyes was filled with nothing but confusion, a silent how do I even explain this?
“Being a fan isn't… it isn't proven by how much you know. You just like someone. It's being full of affection for them.”
“Then is there a separate standard for affection? Whether you've joined the fan club?”
“No! Affection is just affection! We're talking about the heart here!!”
Singer Choi Injun was now on the verge of tearing his hair out.
“What is this? Why can't we understand each other when we're both speaking Korean??”
Tell me about it. I'm frustrated too.
The endless confusion finally came to an end when Jinbae-hyung and Singer Kang Sehyun came looking for us.
“What's gotten into you two?”
“Hyuuung…”
Singer Choi Injun clung to Singer Kang Sehyun like a man who'd just spotted his salvation.
After watching that for a moment, I went over to Jinbae-hyung.
“…? Actor-nim?”
“Did you enjoy the exhibition?”
“Yes, very much! It's been a long time since I relaxed and enjoyed something like that.”
He kept talking with the hem of his suit still caught in my fingers. The two of them, who had spent all that time whispering between themselves, finally came over.
Singer Kang Sehyun, wearing an expression somewhere between amused and bemused, spoke first.
“Hmm. Should we get some food in us first?”
The meal proceeded in heavy silence.
For one thing, being treated like an alien hadn't exactly put me in a cheerful mood—and for another, Singer Choi Injun was too busy whispering to Singer Kang Sehyun to pay anyone else any attention.
Would've been better to just eat with Jinbae-hyung, the two of us.
That would have been far more comfortable all around.
I stared blankly into space as I chewed pasta I couldn't taste at all.
It was Singer Kang Sehyun who broke the stillness.
“Yeonjae, you've got a fansign coming up, right?”
“Yes. In about two weeks.”
“Will that be your first time meeting fans?”
“…….”
I stared at him for a moment, wondering if he was joking too.
Once I realized he wasn't, I set down my fork.
These two have been on something since earlier, honestly.
“Obviously not.”
“Oh, you've met fans before?”
“Yes. You, hyung.”
“…? Me?”
“Yes. You told me at the start that you were my fan, remember?”
The absurdity of it ruined whatever composure my face had been managing.
'Hello, I'm Kang Sehyun. I'm your fan—such an honor to meet you.'
Does he not remember his own words?
When I recited what he'd said to me at our very first meeting word for word, he stared back, dumbstruck.
“No, that was just a polite greeting…”
Who doesn't know that? The point is, you said it yourself.
I genuinely could not understand what these two were trying to get at anymore.
It felt like some vast cliff had opened up between them and me, splitting us apart.
The one who bridged that hopeless gap was Jinbae-hyung, who had been quietly listening all along.
“Actor-nim.”
“Yes?”
“The reason you feel like you can't follow this conversation with Sehyun-ssi and Injun-ssi is that you think differently about the word 'fan.'”
Jinbae-hyung gave my hand a gentle pat, as if to say it was all right, and smiled.
“What do you think a fan is, Actor-nim?”
It was a question like being asked to confirm that 1+1=2, but I opened my mouth slowly all the same, in case some trap was hiding in it.
“Someone who likes something.”
“Exactly. Whether that affection runs shallow or deep, anyone who likes you can use the word 'fan.'”
I nodded along obediently.
“But the people who come to your fansign in two weeks will like you far more than the people you've thought of as fans until now.”
“…? Why?”
“Because unlike someone like Sehyun-ssi, who'll keep running into you and tosses out those light, polite words, they're fans traveling from all over the country for one reason only—to see you.”
Traveling from all over the country just to see me?
Whether I furrowed my brow or not, Jinbae-hyung carried his explanation through to the end.
“The way I see it, Injun-ssi is a fan who likes you enough that he would gladly attend that fansign. Am I wrong?”
“No. You're right…”
Singer Choi Injun mumbled with his head hung low again—the same reaction I'd seen earlier.
With no idea where to even begin digesting all this, he could only blink.
“So… being a fan is a word that serious? Something that deep? Like the way Kim Hoyun feels about Jung Hanna?”
“That varies from person to person. There's no law defining what makes a fan in the first place. But there are certainly people who like you that deeply, Actor-nim. With pure hearts, no less.”
An enormous pressure settled over me in an instant.
The fansign, which I had been thinking of as nothing more than a chance to meet some strangers, took on an entirely different weight.
There are people who like me that much.
“Why…?”
“…….”
“They barely know anything about me. So why do they like me?”
I had understood long ago why Kim Hoyun loved Jung Hanna. That wasn't something that could be explained by any reason—it was simply a feeling.
But how could someone who didn't know me like me that deeply? Was that even possible?
My stomach felt stuffed and heavy, the same sensation I'd had when receiving birthday presents.
Just like back then, I wished Jinbae-hyung would send the others away.
But this time he didn't. He simply took my hand and said this.
“Actor-nim. You know by now that you can like someone for no reason at all. And you know that you can like someone deeply even before you know them well.”
I nodded slowly.
Baek Seojin, Kim Hoyun—these were all feelings I'd only just begun to vaguely grasp lately.
“And yet you still find it hard to accept?”
“Accept what?”
“That one of those someones could be you.”
No idea. Nothing like that.
For once, my own mouth clamped shut like a clam. I won't be able to say a word to An-gae after this.
I closed my eyes and turned the words over again in my mind.
My stomach churned, but I held out.
These were Jinbae-hyung's words, and he would only say them for my sake. Walking away and calling this too hard to understand would be childish. And yet…
“Let's… stop here for today. Hyung.”
To the words I offered quietly, a calm all right came back.
Singer Kang Sehyun rose without a word of complaint and, at the entrance of the restaurant, stroked my hair.
“You've still got two weeks. Don't be too scared.”
“…….”
He added that if I had anything I wanted to ask, I should reach out anytime.
And so two weeks passed, and the long-awaited fansign drew near.