Work Text:
Practise. Lunch. Practise. Dinner. Practise. Sleep. Rinse and repeat.
The schedule has been a constant repetition of this for as many days as you can remember. Even after they came back from the tour everything has been hectic, not leaving much time for rest. There was a brief pause in it all when Mark and Taeyong went back to the US to promote with Super M, and you don’t envy them. At least you got somewhat of a pause, some time to breath. Some time to figure out how to exist outside of performing.
And yet. You miss it. The high of standing on a stage, of connecting with the audience. Of losing yourself to the adrenaline, becoming nothing more than a body dancing, of performing the songs and choreography that has become muscle memory from the hours upon hours of practise.
You miss all of that. So you throw yourself into practise, exhausting yourself like at a concert, but it isn’t the same. None of the feelings of a concert exists in a practice room. You can only see yourself in the mirrors, not the sea of people you want. Just red locks, and an empty room. Blank walls and a sweaty face. It’s not the same.
And yet. You continue on. What else can you do? Sure, practise may not fill the void, but neither does not doing anything. Some days you get other members to come with you, sometimes you’re on your own, sometimes you’re all there (except Mark and Taeyong, and Donghyuck when he has schedules with Dreams, and Sicheng is still missing, a spot that Jungwoo is probably meant to fill, but he has his own spot in the dynamic, leaving a gaping hole-).
So you practise. Sometimes you do other things. Sometimes you do nothing, but at the very base of it all is the practise. Practise upon practise upon practise. It’s tiring, so sometimes like today you come home to the dorm, you greet whoever you meet, and then you flop onto your bed. Stares unfocused up at the ceiling. Ponders at life while tracing a crack with your eyes. The room is silent, just the occasional quiet chattering of the others filtering in through the door.
Someone comes in and says, “Yuta” and you come with them to have dinner, and then you head to the shower. Stares at drops of water tracing a way down the tiles. Dries up and heads to bed. Rinse and repeat.
It isn’t all bad though. Like that it seems to be, but it really isn’t. You know that at the end of the year you will be going to Japan to have concerts. The pressure of knowing that you have something to prepare for maybe should feel like something looming, but it doesn’t. Because you’ll be going back to Japan. A chance to feel that familiarity again. Sure, Korea is a home for you, here in Seoul with your groupmates, but Japan will always hold a special place in your heart. You know that Sicheng feels the same, he talked about it when Wayv started promoting, how freeing and uplifting it was to have so much focus on promoting in China. You’re sure that Johnny and Mark feels the same every time you go to America for some form of schedule.
So you look forward to going to Japan. A part of that anticipation makes you train harder, work to be better. You want to give the fans the best version of yourself that you possibly could. You know the others feels the same, but the fact that it’s Japan is special to you. You know that when you’ll hear the cheers of the fans all pressure will wash straight off, and it’ll be like the stress was never even there to begin with.
Even though you’re still backstage you can still hear the crowd. A vibration of low tone, destined to shake it’s way into your very core. To fill you up until nothing exists but you, the stage and the fans. The euphoria of simply existing, with no duties or pressures of life.
When you finally step onto the stage of the arena, the crowd is there, you see the sea of people you’ve been longing for, instead of blank walls, a sweaty face and empty rooms. A calm peace settles over you, as adrenaline starts pumping through your veins. This. This is all you’ve been longing for all along.
“みんなさん、元気ですか?”x You shout the words, even though you have the mic, and your cheeks hurt from the strain of your smile, but you wouldn't have it any other way. The answer from the crowd is deafening, entering deep into your very being.
The arena is filled to the brim, of emotions and expectations and hopes and stress, of miseries washing off and disappearing. This is where you feel at peace, a secondary home to those where you have your family. A home constantly on the move, with different people and different reliefs. Every arena, every concert is different in its own way.
The fans sing along where they can, and the waves of it hits you, powers you to keep going, to go harder. When their stomps makes the floor vibrate you can’t help but to bounce along to it all, trying to absorb every bit of euphoria you can.
This is where you feel the most alive.