IT'S NOTHING.
"He said nothing, out of fear of losing everything."
ONE-SIDED!SHIN WOO / MI NYU.
MENTIONS OF TAE KYUNG / MI NYU.
A/N I missed the last few episodes and never got around to watching them, so I just wrote from what I remembered of the episodes I actually watched. It was a lovely show. Anyway, this is a near-character study of Shin Woo, just because he was robbed in the show. ROBBED, I TELL YOU.
(Totally kidding.)
...Enjoy! :D
Being friendly to their new member had always been Shin Woo's intention. It was questionable if anybody else would be. If he knew his band mates as well as he thought he did, Tae Kyung would probably drive the new member out of the house within minutes with his my-way-or-the-highway attitude. Shin Woo would counteract his friend's obsessive compulsive tendencies with offering a cup of tea, which he found helped in dealing with any manic 'it's-not-spotless-unless-I-can-see-my-face-in-it' episodes his band mate had. Jeremy wouldn't let the new member get anywhere friendship-wise until they proved themselves in a water balloon fight, an eating contest, or a prank war, all equally dangerous with Jeremy involved. Jeremy had a tendency to have the funniest ideas, but the worst execution. Shin Woo would clean up the mess and scold Jeremy for throwing things at their new member and various strangers (again), but he would also probably spray them both with the hose.
His role in the band (the logical, reasonable, sane one) did not bother him. After all, being courteous when nobody was had to have its benefits and he would reap them in time. Maybe the new member would even look up to him as a big brother, as Jeremy did.
But then he came along. He wasn't prepared for this, for him. He had carried out his original plan to best of his abilities, but Mi Nam had proved to be different from what they were expecting. His voice was of an angel's, as their manager had so gleefully proclaimed. He seemed very dedicated to fitting in with the band, even a bit too dedicated. He hardly interacted with people at the party, save for his manager. In Shin Woo's eyes, Mi Nam seemed a little wary of them all, though Tae Kyung had only forced him to prove his singing abilities once (Shin Woo knew he could (and would, in the future) have done worse) and Jeremy hadn't coerced him to do anything spontaneous or potentially combustible yet. But Shin Woo waved all these things off as nerves from the new world Mi Nam was getting into, and tried to help their new member adjust to their high-profile and fast-paced lifestyle as best he could.
But then the rooftop thing happened. And somehow, after that, he found himself tangled up in her.
He didn't want to let her in. She wasn't supposed to be here to begin with. Here in the band, as he specifically remembered their manager saying something about her being a him (but their manager didn't know there was a 'her' to begin with). She wasn't supposed to be here, next to him, as he tended to scrape on her hand. Next to him, sharing an ice cream, because coincidently, they both enjoyed vanilla and strawberry and nobody thought it was strange that they were sharing. Here, worried about being singled out to sing a song and becoming a real singer and not just someone posing as someone else.
But he wanted to let her in. He had simply wanted to help Mi Nam up so they could make a quick getaway before the paparazzi got word of the incident. But her skin, and softness and everything was a mystery he found himself wanting to unravel. Which was strange to him, because, he had to admit that they all looked slightly more feminine than usual guys but Mi Nam took it to outrageous standards. And then he accidentally found the answer, not that she would ever know that. At least, not yet. That embarrassing story of asking a girl if they killed dogs while forsaking his original accent simply rolled off his tongue while around her.
She had odd quirks and habits - tilting her head in confusion and wrinkling her brow, her wondrous eyes, having a childlike air about her and finding joy in the simplest things, and her confusion about many pop culture facts that were common knowledge. And yet, these things only made him grow closer to her.
He closed his eyes and tried to remember why he was torturing himself by thinking about this. He couldn't take this anymore. He needed to run away.
But that was her job, wasn't it?
He knew that she was growing closer Tae Kyung. It was done. Once she fell for him, there was no looking back. Shin Woo would be second best and nothing more.
Of course it was Tae Kyung.
It was always Tae Kyung.
But Shin Woo had never been anything but a realistic optimist. He clung onto his and Mi Nam's friendship, daring to hope for the impossible, that she would look past his friendly façade. Maybe she would see that she was killing him slowly. When he had gone to pick her up from her father's hometown, he knew she had been expecting Tae Kyung. But he dared to believe that maybe, just maybe, she was running towards him with that adoring look for him and no one else. When he hugged her and hid her face from the paparazzi, he dared to dream that the lies spilling out of his mouth were real. They were a couple and they were lovely still. Of course they were. He was lying.
When he kissed her forehead and saw her eyes go wide and watch her body go slack and fall to the ground, he dared to pretend that the shock wasn't from her real thoughts ("Oh my goodness, someone I don't think of that way just implied something."). When he boarded the plane to visit his parents, he dared to hope that she would follow and say it was all a mistake and really, there was never anyone else for her but him. And when he witnessed the countless times she wanted to cry, wanted to give up, wanted to run away…he comforted her. He assumed the role of the best friend, not realizing that this was it - this was all there ever was and ever will be.
When it finally sunk in, his hundred-watt smile looked slightly off, like there was something holding it back from putting the sun to shame. His final hugs to her became the whispered goodbye he had hoped he would never have to say. But he saw her after that. She just didn't see him, not in the way he wanted.
But Shin Woo didn't care. He was going to be her friend, when no one else was. He didn't want to lose her, even just the smallest part of her she had let him get to know. It was fine. He was used to saying nothing, out of fear of losing everything.