The first radio show all of Spark appeared on was "Moonlit Night Conversation," hosted by a member of a famous idol group.
The DJ of Moonlit Night who had kept the program going for years, Polo, the rapper of MYTH’s flagship group Hellas, was...
"Then our Iwol... ahem. Oh man, I’m sorry! I mean, your faces are all incredibly handsome, but you came wearing such cute headbands!"
He couldn’t hold back his laughter every time he looked at us. I thought he’d be professional — unfortunate.
"As those of you watching the viewable radio know, our Spark members came wearing cute headbands with their names on them."
"We wore them with rookie bravado!"
"Was this something the company told you to do?"
"No, Iwol hyung..."
At Polo’s question, the one I trusted, Park Juu, snitched. How many pancakes did I feed you and you dare rat me out?
"Do you order-make these headbands? If you tell them the name, they make it like this?"
"No, I made them."
"You made these?"
"Yes. We had the materials at the dorm."
Drawing on the experience of making school festival supplies for the son of the Hanpyeong Industries CEO, I crafted them stitch by stitch with care.
"Iwol, contrary to appearances, you’re extremely frugal!"
"Right? Our hyung looks totally like a young master, but he’s super thrifty!"
At Polo’s words, Lee Cheonghyeon chimed in, excited.
Young master, huh. Isn’t that you?
After that, Polo and the punks spent the entire first segment carrying on trivial talk, going out of their way to read comments like "The headband quality is so good!"
Even during ads, the headband talk didn’t end.
With his fingers interlaced and his chin propped, Polo looked over and asked:
"I’m genuinely curious — why do you have these kinds of materials at the dorm?"
"We bought them to make props for self-content, and there were leftovers."
"You make props too? That’s awesome."
At first I thought he was making small talk because there wasn’t much to say to a rookie group, but no matter how I looked at it, this guy seemed truly fixated on my handmade headbands.
I watched for about three minutes to see if his interest was real or an act, then said:
"Just in case, I made one for you too, sunbaenim. Can I give it to you now?"
"For me? Don’t tell me it’s a headband?"
"Yes."
"Seriously?!"
Since he wanted it so much, I hoped he’d wear it too; I took out a headband shining in gold from the bag I’d left outside the recording booth and handed it to him, and Polo doubled over laughing.
"Mine is gold?"
"You’re the DJ of Moonlit Night Conversation. I modeled it after a shining yellow moon."
I clapped as I looked at Polo wearing the headband, making a nonsensical pun. It was my habitual flattery — “it suits you well.”
Sitting next to me, Kang Giyeon whispered:
"When did you make the sunbaenim’s?"
"First of all. You always take care of the boss’s stuff first."
I straightened Kang Giyeon’s slightly crooked headband and tidied his baby hairs. It was almost time for segment two to begin.
"We’re back after the ads. And in the meantime, everyone, I’ve got a name headband too!"
"Wow!"
Maybe because I’d trained their reactions hard, everyone’s response speed was top tier. Of course, I smiled and joined in enthusiastically.
"In part two, a time to get to know our Spark in more detail! We’ve prepared a member quiz!"
The format was simple. The member across from you asked quiz questions about himself, and you had to get as many right as possible within the time limit.
Regarding this, we’d received a pre-show questionnaire from the writers and filled it out.
The problem was, the punks probably wouldn’t get a single one of my questions right.
In quizzes like this, TMI about the member basically comes out. Things like birthday, number of siblings, favorite song.
And I had never told the members these stories. Which means the punks couldn’t possibly know the answers.
I almost tipped off Jeong Seongbin, who’d be sitting across from me, because if he did too poorly it might spark “discord rumors,” but if he did too well people would say we rigged it, so I held back.
"Good thing there aren’t any sibling questions."
Given that when I tried to talk about my sister my voice wouldn’t come out and my mind went blank, if I got that question now I might cause the disgrace of saying I’m an only child despite having a sister.
First up, the Park Juu–Kang Giyeon pair each got four or five out of ten, showing a decent level of interest. Years as roommates paid off.
The other roommates, the Choi Jeho–Lee Cheonghyeon pair, weren’t bad either.
Although Choi Jeho posted a sluggish three, Lee Cheonghyeon pulled off seven.
"Jeho hyung, do you just have zero interest in me?"
"I mean, how am I supposed to know what color socks you put on today..."
"I even got your shoelace color right!"
"...Sorry."
Still, three is impressive growth. Last time I saw, even in his third year he only got two.
"Okay, last up is Iwol and Seongbin. Seongbin, a word of determination!"
"I’ll do my best! Hyung, let’s go!"
Across from me, Jeong Seongbin shook his fist like he was cheering me on.
And true to his resolve, Jeong Seongbin put up a respectable fight.
"What’s the video I’ve watched the most recently?"
"Our MV."
"Then which member do I think fits this concept the best?"
"Cheonghyeon!"
He got four, no less. I was genuinely surprised.
I wondered if he guessed, but Seongbin had his own kind of conviction.
"Did Cheonghyeon match this album’s concept well?"
"Ah, Iwol hyung really likes Cheonghyeon’s face!"
"Do I?"
Is this because I said “handsome” when practicing for fan-sign lines looking at Lee Cheonghyeon? The basis for his certainty was so flimsy I was flustered.
"Now Iwol has to get five or more. How about it? Confident?"
"I’ll do my best!"
When I answered energetically, Jeong Seongbin clapped. What on earth was this spectacle.
Regardless of my deep wave of reality check, Polo forged ahead with gusto.
"Great! Then start!"
"I don’t know if you’ll know this, hyung... What’s my go-to song?"
"Seongdo sunbaenim’s ‘Sunlit.’"
"Correct! Which homeroom class number was I in last year?"
"Class 3?"
On the second one I answered like I was hesitating a bit, but honestly, whatever the question, I can get it. As long as it’s not something like “say the last digits of the member’s resident ID.”
"What’s my favorite color?"
"Purple."
"Say the title of my favorite movie!"
"‘The Last Performance’!"
Next to me, Kang Giyeon muttered, "Hyung, what are you...?"
Come on, how could I not know this much. How many years have I listened to Spark radio.
With one question left, the minute ended in a flash. Exclamations burst from all sides.
"Iwol, nine total!"
"If hyung had more time he’d have gotten them all, huh? Are you JandiWiki or what!"
Lee Cheonghyeon attempted a long-distance high five. I waved my hand appropriately in the air.
"Wow, Iwol, you must be super interested in the members!"
"Luckily they asked things I knew. I think I was just fortunate!"
Say it like this to avoid being consumed as "Jeong Seongbin’s rabid fan Kim Iwol."
I wished the system would hurry up and recognize how hard I was working to avoid being exposed together with the members. ★ 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 ★ Then maybe it would hurry and approve.
Thanks to me getting nine, the Iwol–Jeong Seongbin pair took first place.
Since the first-place mission was taking a friendship selfie, I held the camera for Jeong Seongbin, who is abysmal at selfies. A momentous schedule.
Even after that, the system showed little reaction.
Was it not only the way of speaking that was like Deputy Manager Nam, but the approval speed was synced to him too? My anger boiled up.
The system came back to me on a day right before the final music show.
In the car returning from filming a MeTube program, the manager startled me with a totally unexpected remark.
"Our actual school uniforms?"
"Yeah. Since it’s the last show, maybe we go with a concept that feels more real! The company’s basically agreed it’s good."
With the final show a week away, the Planning Team had floated the idea: "Let’s show what our kids were really like in their school days!"
"Manager, I didn’t go to high school, so I don’t have a high school uniform..."
"Uh... would your middle school uniform not fit, Juu?"
My head throbbed on its own.
Having them bring their own uniforms was an idea I’d considered too.
But I hadn’t carried it out. Because not all six had uniforms.
Setting aside the day we happened to get dropped at the Spark dorm with just one suitcase —
Park Juu, who didn’t go to high school, wouldn’t have a uniform that fit, and Choi Jeho, who graduated long ago, would have his uniform far away at his family home.
Still, with two punks already without uniforms, I wouldn’t have to worry about mine...
"I’ll ask my family if they can send it by courier."
"Then Jeho hyung is set. Juu, how about wearing civvies that give a school-look vibe? Manager, if they’re each wearing their own uniforms, the colors don’t have to match exactly, right?"
...Somehow the situation was turning weird.
Choi Jeho was saying he’d ask his family, and Jeong Seongbin was taking care of other people’s clothing too.
"I think that’ll be fine. Then everyone’s okay with bringing clothes, right?"
We are not.
We are very not!
