by Nara Noelle
“I don’t know. Maybe they’ll add a few scenes to make the alpha students look better in comparison,” I said. Although I pretended to be nonchalant, the thing was, while my freestyle rap for the first assessment had been embarrassing, I badly wanted it to be shown to the viewers. Anything was better than being a nobody.
Juno glanced into his bag of chips and sighed. “Are the rest of us really that awful? Gosh, I wish I’d been assigned to alpha tier.”
“And so do thirty-nine other students.”
Chapter 9
Honey
Ever woken up feeling calm and refreshed to absolute stillness? It’s a telltale sign of waking up late, isn’t it? Except in my case, I hadn’t even stayed in bed for long; it wasn’t even five o’clock yet. Nevertheless, I’d slept through my alarm, which had been set at 4:00 and 4:30, considering how I’d intended to head over to the west wing before the cameras switched on for the day.
Since my bed was twice as big as the tiny frameless mattress in my old windowless, closet-sized room and ten times more comfortable, it wasn’t easy to get up. However, as soon as I pictured Executive Song sipping on his stupid mojito, I didn’t want to waste my morning lazing around. It was too late for me to sneak into Rye’s room, but I still wanted to find a way to get to the west wing.
Shortly after I went down to the first floor, deep, obnoxious roars hit my ears. Ugh. Not again. When I heard footsteps coming in my direction, I darted to the nearest door. It was filled with mops, buckets, and brooms, some of which were still a little damp. I quickly shut myself inside, leaving a small gap to peep through. Although I felt like an utter coward, it was better than starting off my day by being pushed around and made fun of by my nasty classmates. Besides, I didn’t have an excuse to share in case they’d interrogate me on what I was doing so early in the morning.
Twenty seconds later, four guys in royal-blue T-shirts appeared—alpha students. These weren’t the same boys who’d made fun of me in the hallway last night, but I wasn’t relieved by the discovery either. To say that they didn’t look any more approachable than the other group would’ve been an understatement. These boys seemed older. Not only were they taller, but even their voices sounded gruffer. Each of them carried a paper bag in one hand.
To my dismay, they stopped and sat down on some sofas, which were a mere five feet away from my hiding spot. It was then that I recognized the leader of the pack. Mas. Although his vocal ability had been less than impressive to the point where the judges seemed baffled by his unreasonable confidence, he’d somehow been assigned to alpha tier. While it hadn’t even been a week since my classmates and I arrived on Starsaw Island, we knew better than to mess with him.
For one, Mas was bigger than everyone else. He was as burly as RJ and only an inch or two shorter. This was something he seemed to take great pride in. He made a point of guzzling protein shakes instead of water with his meals and encouraged others to follow suit, especially “bobbleheads with feminine shoulders.” In addition, he repeatedly complained to the chefs about being served greasy pork—which was actually pretty damn delicious and came from a pig farm on the island—instead of chicken breast. Anytime he opened his mouth, I couldn’t help but think of how if he ever became famous, his name needed to be added to the dictionary with the description “self-absorbed meathead.”
I loathed all of his other traits just as much, down to the way he wore his T-shirts with the sleeves rolled up to his shoulders. I gathered this was to show off the tattoos covering his bulging biceps. It was too bad his gaudy, wannabe-yakuza-style koi fish tattoos were so poorly drawn and tacky.
On top of that, he seemed to think he was God’s gift to women. In his introduction video, he’d bragged about how the girls at his former high school, Waverly Performing Arts Academy, had created a fan club for him. If that wasn’t a lie, I didn’t understand what they saw in him. God, I hated his face, including his upturned eyebrows. I know, eyebrows are such a trivial thing to pick apart, but ever since he arched them while he yelled at one of the chefs, I wanted to pluck them off his face.
“Yo, Mas,” a boy with highlighter-orange hair called out as he took out a bottle of vodka from his paper bag.
“Give me that,” Mas slurred, waving his hand toward the orange-haired boy. “Rich, throw it to me.”
Aha. So they’d been up drinking. Though underage drinking didn’t faze me—I’d woken up to a pool of piss and puke dripping down from the top bunk for years—I did wonder how they could’ve gotten their hands on some alcohol.
“What the fuck, dude? It’s five now,” a guy who wore his baseball cap backward hissed, slapping Rich on the arm.
“So what, Kisu?” Rich responded, getting up.
“So keep that shit in the paper bag, you fool,” Kisu said, adjusting his baseball cap.
“Okay.” Rich put the vodka into the bag, only to take it back out seconds later and throw it toward a trash can.
Smash.
I muffled my gasp with my hand a moment too late. Thankfully, the four boys didn’t seem to have heard me; they were too distracted by the bits of glass scattered on the vodka-soaked ground. Why did entitled assholes have to create such filth when they were drunk?
The situation brought back memories of when I used to work night shifts. After a certain hour, everyone who returned to the ramshackle dormitory facility had been a raging alcoholic—some of whom were homeless and needed a free place to sleep.
“What’d you do that for? I wanted to drink that!” the fourth member of the group barked.
“Christ, Al. Not you too. You guys are idiots. I’m going to sleep,” Kisu proclaimed. He got off the sofa and stumbled as he took his first step forward, only to sit back down immediately afterward.
“Don’t be a spoilsport,” Rich slurred with a yawn.
“Rich is right. Here, Kisu, catch this.” Mas held up an open bottle of vodka, guzzled it, then slammed it down on the floor in front of him. After a moment of silence, he began cackling as if he’d heard the funniest joke in the world, and his equally moronic friends followed suit.
They threw more bottles around—obviously fucking around for the sake of it. Five minutes later, once their laughter died down, they went to their rooms. Of course, they left bits of glass everywhere; these selfish brats didn’t give a damn about the mess they were leaving behind.
Just as I decided to leave the cleaning cupboard—fuming with anger at how helpless I’d been—a gaunt, elderly cleaner came and stopped in front of the trash can. She let out an exhausted sigh, then, to my horror, approached my hiding spot.
When she opened the door and saw me, she wobbled back in shock. Though I expected her to question what I was doing or perhaps even blame me for the broken bottles on the ground, she simply smiled at me.
“I-I’m lost,” I faltered.
“It’s alright, son. I’m not sure what was going on here, but it looks like you can head back to your room now,” she said.
Once I stepped out of the way, she grabbed a broom and a dustpan. God, I felt dreadful. The broken shards on the ground felt like my doing.
“Here,” I said, taking the broom from her. “Let me clean this up. This is the least I can do.”
Chapter 10
RJ
Idol rapper. It’s a title some cunts use to undermine my talent and diminish my achievements, but I always knew better than to get emotional about that shit. At the end of the day, whenever I spit a new verse, I had crowds of SKYs—the name for our fans—eager to listen to it on repeat and turn the song into a hit. The fact was, I had a huge global fanbase that other rappers would die to have even a fraction of.
From the moment I first laid eyes on the students of Idol High, where I was going to be their rap teacher, I knew these kids—some who were merely three years younger than me but were so naïve to the reality of stardom that they seemed like grade-schoolers—had a long way to go. I don’t say this to be condescending or because I’m jealous of any of them; what I
mean is these boys had no presence. Although they were dressed head to toe in expensive streetwear brands, it was blatantly obvious that they were nothing but sheltered little performing arts school brats. So when they proceeded to perform slight variations of the same tired old raps for their first assessment, I wasn’t even disappointed; it was exactly what I’d expected of them.
“Welcome to my rap class,” I said to the epsilon students as they came into the recording studio and joined me around a long table.
“Hey, Teach!” a nerd in a white bucket hat called out. “I’m so pumped for this class.”
“Same. RJ, you’re my favorite rapper,” another dweeb said.
“Thanks, guys. We’ve got an exciting semester ahead of us,” I proclaimed.
A couple of students cheered. Though I put on a smile, frankly, these guys were a lost cause. I was willing to bet my right hand that none of them would make it past the first round of viewer votes. However, I couldn’t exactly twiddle my thumbs and ignore them for the next two hours when we were being filmed. If there’s one thing I’ve learned from being in the spotlight at a young age, it was the art of putting on a façade.
Once everyone quietened down, I announced, “We’re going to start off the semester with a lesson on lyricism. Why are we getting into the writing process, you ask? Let me be straight with you guys: it’s not because the other aspects of your performances were perfect. Anyway, after watching some of you rap for your first assessment, I discovered that while some of you have a decent rap voice in terms of vocal tone, none of you know how to write lyrics.”
The students nodded.
I continued. “Believe it or not, your ability to write fresh and meaningful lyrics is key. Being a rapper is not about getting blinged out to shoot music videos and perform on stage. Some of you might assume that once you’ve made it big as a mainstream rapper, you can get somebody else to write your lyrics for you. What you need to understand is that to earn people’s respect as a real rapper, and not just as a member of a trendy boy group, you’ve got to know how to write your own verses while making them original and personal. It’s also a blessing. There aren’t many people out there who get to voice their thoughts while the world listens.”
A few of the boys were taking notes. I was surprised they’d actually brought pens and notebooks with them. Well, this was Idol High, so I guess that was what they were meant to be doing. Suddenly, I spotted a guy with red hair—splotchy flaming-red hair, to be specific—dozing off at the other end of the table. Unlike the other students, he wasn’t wearing his name badge. His eyes would flicker shut for a few seconds. Then he’d open them as he shook his head awake. I would’ve ignored him entirely if it wasn’t for the fact that he’d already been on my radar. And not in a good way.
“I remember when I first debuted as the main rapper of STAR. I had no street cred. It wasn’t until I collaborated with some underground rappers on a few tracks and filmed a cipher with them that people began to notice my lyrics, which in turn brought STAR to a new audience.” I paused, my gaze still on the red-haired boy. “Are you guys listening to me? I didn’t turn up here to boast about my achievements, you know. If you didn’t do as well as you wanted in your first assessment, which I presume is the case for everyone here since you guys are epsilons, I suggest you come to my lessons with a humble attitude and a willingness to learn.”
The red-haired boy blushed; the bastard knew I was referring to him alright. I sneered as I recalled how he’d looked like a deer in headlights after I told him to freestyle rap. His name came to mind. Hamin, was it?
“You know what we should do to break the ice? In order for us to familiarize ourselves with each other, and for me to get a grasp of where everyone’s at, why don’t you guys take turns sharing the latest verse you’ve written with the rest of us?” I said, scratching my blond hair as if I’d randomly thought of this idea. The truth was, I knew all of these guys couldn’t rap for shit. Sure, they’d made it onto the island, but they were the bottom of the barrel. I only had one goal in mind.
“Would you like us to go in clockwise order?” mumbled the boy sitting to my left.
“Nope. I’m going to put you guys on the spot.” I pointed at Hamin. “Hey, you. What’s your name?”
“I’m Hamin Han,” he said.
“Hamin, I see you’re not wearing your name badge. I’m pretty sure those were given to you guys for a reason.”
“My bad. I forgot.”
I knitted my brow. Was Idol High School a fucking joke to him? Did he think he could stay on the island, enjoying the state-of-the-art facilities and beautiful scenery, while half-assing what he was supposed to participate in?
“How could you forget when your schedule revolves around filming the show?” I grunted as he shifted in his seat. “Alright. Let’s not waste any more time.” I gestured toward the members of the television crew on the other side of the room. “Could someone turn on an instrumental track? Any type of beat is fine.”
When a melodic rap beat came on, Hamin put up his finger and opened his mouth for a few seconds, then grimaced as he stood up. It wasn’t hard to guess what he’d been on the verge of admitting. Clearly, he’d never written a verse in his life.
“Big hopes, big dreams, big aspirations. Hopped on a plane to Starsaw with high expectations. And… once I make it to the top I’ll have celebrations.”
The minute that followed went by painfully slowly while he thought of the clunkiest and stupidest rhymes. After Hamin stuttered, a couple of students snickered. Although I expected this to crush his soul, he laughed along with them. The stupid dork was trying to act as if entertaining them had been his goal all along.
“That’s it. Thank you for listening to my verse,” Hamin said with a theatrical bow. When he sat down with a contented look on his face, I wanted to lunge across the table and bash his head in.
“I didn’t tell you to sit down yet, did I? Get up,” I snapped, throwing my chair back after I pushed myself off it.
Ha. The little shit didn’t look so comfortable now. Hamin stood up and blinked a few times as if he was trying to snap out of a nightmare.
“What on Earth was that?” I said, clenching my hands into fists.
“What do you mean?” Hamin asked, beaming at me.
Christ, the confusion in his voice riled me up even more. I knew I wasn’t supposed to behave this aggressively, not when I was being filmed. Sammy, Terry, and Arang had repeatedly warned me about taking my rough bad boy persona too far sometimes. They were worried that I would scare young SKYs away and anger their parents. In this situation though? I didn’t give a fuck. I wasn’t going to let a talentless loser take the piss out of my class when I’d worked my ass off to become a renowned idol rapper.
“RJ, I did what you asked me to do,” Hamin whispered.
“No. I asked you to share the last verse you’ve written, not to clown around. Do you think arriving to your first rap class of the semester totally unprepared is something to be proud of?” I snarled as I slammed my fist against the table.
He lowered his gaze. “I-I apologize if I made you feel like I was disrespecting your class. That was not my intention, I swear. The reason I haven’t been working on my rap skills is because it’s been a crazy couple of days. I’m still suffering from jetlag, which might sound ridiculous, but I think it’s because I’ve never been on a plane before. It was a lot to adjust to.”
“Cut the excuses.” I pounded my fist on the table for a second time. “Do you know what it means to participate in a competition? You’ve got to be a hundred percent devoted to proving yourself. If you can’t do that, maybe you should reconsider whether you deserve to be here.”
“I know I’ve got a lot to work on, but I’ll make sure to—”
“Sit down!” I bellowed.
He winced and promptly did as I said.
“Can’t you see you’re wasting everyone’s time? We’ll talk after class,” I added.
“Okay. I’m s
orry,” he replied.
For the rest of the lesson, I did my best to be the brutal yet calm teacher I was supposed to come off as. However, anytime that I wasn’t talking, I was watching Hamin with my peripheral vision. While he pretended to scribble down notes, it was obvious that he didn’t give a crap about becoming a better rapper. I suspected he was not only doing this for the camera, but also to fuck with me. This had to be his way of telling me, “See? I’m trying. You’re the unreasonable one.”
“Didn’t I tell you to stay behind?” I whispered into his ear as he scurried toward the door once class ended.
“Oh. Right,” he murmured.
I flashed a smile at the television crew while they packed up the filming equipment, then grabbed Hamin’s arm and squeezed it firmly.
“Ouch,” he whimpered.
“Jesus, would you shut the fuck up? You sound like such a pussy,” I hissed.
He slowly turned his head toward me.
I chuckled. “What’s the matter? Did you think that I would check up on you to make sure your feelings weren’t hurt? Were you expecting a nice wee pep talk?”
“From you, RJ? No.” He snorted, then peered over at the television crew. What an idiot. He seemed to believe he was safe because they were around.
“What did you just call me?” I grunted.
“RJ. That’s your name, isn’t it? If you want me to call you the king of rap though, I suppose I’m willing to comply,” he retorted.
I slapped his cheek—not so hard that it would leave a mark, but still hard enough to make a harsh sound. When the members of the television crew continued going about their way, completely ignoring what I’d just done, his eyes widened in alarm.
“Listen. Unless you want me to beat your face in, you better refer to me as ‘Teacher’ from now on, you hear me?” I hissed.