Superstar From Age 0

Chapter 26

After finishing all their schedules, brown Black and Seo Eun-chan headed to Seo-jun’s house.

They were stunned by the unexpected applause and the flash of cameras on their way out.

They realized what was happening when they saw Seo Eun-hye and Lee Min-jun setting off fireworks as soon as the front door opened.

They couldn’t help but burst into tears. Seo-jun, who was sandwiched between Brown Black, didn’t cry this time.

He was a bit annoyed by his hyungs who kept clinging to him, so he pushed their faces away.

“Doesn’t Seo-jun seem cold today?”

“I think so too.”

Brown Black quickly washed up and gathered around Seo-jun. To cheer him up, they picked up some dolls.

“Wow. Seo-jun has these dolls?”

“Wow, this is a complete skeleton!”

Brown Black was momentarily surprised by the monster dolls, but soon they read the ‘scenario for playing with Seo-jun’ that Kim Hee-sang, who attended the celebration party, gave them and played with Seo-jun diligently.

Seo-jun’s mood soon improved.

The living room table was soon filled with delicious food.

They showed him the real-time search results and chatted happily. Then Lee Min-jun spoke up.

“We’re going to America.”

“What?”

“We’re going to America. In about a month.”

“America?!”

Brown Black exclaimed in surprise. Kim Hee-sang and Seo Eun-chan, who had become close to Brown Black in a month, just drank their beer as if they already knew.

“Yeah. Min-jun got transferred to the US branch. We’ll be back in two or three years.”

“We decided to go together because it would be lonely to go alone.”

Brown Black nodded with a blank expression. Then they looked at Seo-jun, who was sucking on Lich King’s hand.

Two or three years.

It was a long time.

“Where in America are you going?”

“LA. Los Angeles.”

Lee Min-jun answered when Kevin asked in a quiet voice.

“We have a house in LA. Everyone else moved out, so only my Noona lives there now…”

Kevin showed them a picture on his phone. It was a family photo.

There were two men and two women, and Kevin looked younger than he did now.

“This is my hyung and this is my Noona.”

They saw a stern-looking man and a cheerful woman.

Lee Min-jun and Seo Eun-hye looked at the photo.

“I’ll contact my Noona, so if you have any problems or questions, call her. Here’s her number.”

“It would be nice to have someone we know in America, but can you give this to us so easily?”

“Hahaha.”

Kevin laughed at Lee Min-jun’s question.

“It’s okay. My Noona is very outgoing. She’ll be very happy to have more friends. She’s so bored that she’ll come out and play with you as soon as you call her. Well, of course, if she doesn’t have work.”

“Really? Thank you. I’ll definitely contact her.”

Seo Eun-hye held the number tightly.

They decided to go because they had no one to care about, but paradoxically, they were a bit scared because they had no one to rely on.

They were glad to have someone to ask about life in America.

***

Seo Eun-hye stroked Seo-jun’s hair as he fell asleep.

Lee Min-jun also quietly looked at Seo-jun’s face. Seo-jun’s mouth moved as if he was eating something in his dream.

“I thought I was someone who didn’t have any prejudices…”

Seo Eun-hye said with a hint of self-reproach, and Lee Min-jun smiled. He felt the same way.

“It can’t be helped. We’re parents.”

“But still, it felt wrong.”

Seo Eun-hye felt a pang in her heart when she saw Seo-jun, who hugged each of the monster dolls that came back home after the shooting.

And in the video of [48 Hours], he didn’t touch the mimic doll at all.

When she asked Seo Eun-chan, he said that he didn’t touch it for the entire 48 hours, except for the first time.

“Our Seo-jun is so kind and smart. He seems to be too aware of mom and dad’s feelings.”

“…We made him that way, didn’t we?”

Seo Eun-hye, who lost her father when she was young, had lived bravely without giving up, even though she sometimes got hurt by the careless words of some people.

She thought she was living happily without caring about other people’s eyes, as she had overcome those prejudices and grown up.

But she was wrong.

Seo-jun didn’t hear it, but the words of someone who said ‘That baby, his dolls are weird’ a long time ago were stuck in Seo Eun-hye’s mind.

The words of the dolls being weird turned into the words of the baby being weird, and it haunted Seo Eun-hye’s head. Lee Min-jun, who heard the story from Seo Eun-hye, also became a bit sensitive.

They didn’t know it, but it became their trauma.

“We might not care, but Seo-jun shouldn’t hear those words.”

“Yeah. What if Seo-jun gets hurt?”

So the couple played with the monster dolls that Seo-jun liked at home.

The baby moms were nice people, so they didn’t hide it, but they didn’t take the dolls outside.

They only took a bear doll that looked normal.

But that bear doll was also not normal, as they found out when they washed the dolls.

They realized that it was Kim Hee-sang’s consideration, who knew the couple’s feelings and thought of Seo-jun.

But that situation, which they tried so hard, made Seo-jun more aware of their feelings.

It made this little baby worry.

As they wondered how to make Seo-jun feel comfortable, and not to care about mom and dad’s feelings, and play well with the dolls, Lee Min-jun got a transfer to the US branch.

America.

A place where diverse people live together.

A place where there are people with different personalities, and even uniqueness can be an advantage.

They thought it would be better than Korea, where they knew too many people and had to care about them, to go to America, where they didn’t know anyone.

They thought that if they changed their surroundings and met different people, seo Eun-hye and Lee Min-jun’s trauma would get better.

So Seo Eun-hye and Lee Min-jun decided to go to America with Seo-jun.

They had enough money.

Seo Eun-hye and Lee Min-jun, who saw the account connected to YouTube for the first time in a long time, held their hearts that were beating like crazy at the sight of the unbelievable numbers.

And then they took out some of the money for Seo-jun and donated it to various organizations.

“I’m going to study more in America.”

“Seo-jun will see a wider world.”

Mom and dad decided to go to America for themselves and for Seo-jun.

***

Seo-jun went to the park not far from the apartment with his mom in a stroller. It was chilly, but he was warm in his thick clothes.

As he sat on the bench and received the warm sunlight with his mom, he heard a murmuring sound. It was the couple sitting on the opposite bench.

“That baby, isn’t he the one who came out with Brown Black? He was on WNET.”

“Really? I don’t know.”

“Why? I can tell just by looking at him.”

“Aren’t kids that age all similar?”

The woman nodded at the man’s words, who tilted his head. Well, it was hard to tell babies apart by their faces.

“But, did you watch 48 Hours?”

“Yeah. It was fun. It must be really hard to take care of a baby.”

Seo Eun-hye carefully relaxed her stiff body and got up from her seat.

She made sure not to show any signs of avoidance and blocked the front of Seo-jun’s stroller as she slowly moved away from the bench.

As they moved away from the spot where the couple was sitting, seo Eun-hye found a place where there were no people and sat down on the ground.

“Mommy?”

“Wow. You even got recognized outside?”

Brown Black had debuted a month ago.

They made an impression as a talented idol group with their first debut stage, and even after a month, they were busy with broadcasts and events.

They had no time to make phone calls, and Seo Eun-chan couldn’t go home more than before his debut. Seo Eun-hye and her mother had already given up.

As Brown Black’s popularity rose, so did the number of people who looked for 48 Hours on YouTube.

When it became a hot topic on the internet, wNET sent a proposal to Seo Eun-chan’s side to re-edit and release 48 Hours.

“It’s a late-night show anyway, so there won’t be many viewers. Besides, you’re going to America soon. The kids will grow so much by then that no one will recognize them when they come back.”

The uncle who used his nephew for Brown Black’s success, seo Eun-chan said that it didn’t matter since they had already uploaded it on YouTube, and the couple agreed.

WNET edited the video to be aired on television, taking into account the opinions of Seo Eun-hye and Lee Min-jun. This time, it was edited with Brown Black as the center rather than Seo-jun.

“I think it’s okay to put this in this time.”

The video that they didn’t upload on YouTube. Seo Eun-chan decided to upload the video of the man he met at the playground for this broadcast.

Seo Eun-chan went to Seo-jun’s apartment to get the man’s consent and heard the story from him. Wow. How did I not know? The manager, seo Eun-chan, regretted it.

“I’m really sorry!”

“No, it’s fine. It was good publicity.”

“It wasn’t really publicity!”

With the man’s permission, the cable channel edited and uploaded the man’s post, the comments on the board, and the video of the playground.

-Really?

-It wasn’t really publicity?

-Why didn’t they upload it on the YouTube version?

-Then they would have said it was a fake. Who would go to a concert of an unknown idol group and ask for an autograph because they liked the song?

-True.

The man on the screen smiled brightly.

“This is the first autograph!”

It was the official first autograph that was recognized by the broadcast.

-When Brown Black becomes famous, it will be very expensive.

-Yeah, the story is good too.

-Envy…

…

-But the baby is cute too.

-He seems smart, doesn’t he? Smarter than the other kids. And he doesn’t seem shy at all. He never cries.

-Isn’t he the one? The legendary mukbang kid who went viral with his eating videos.

-Oh, yeah. That’s him. I’ve seen him on YouTube ads lately. The one with the elephant.

***

“Let’s go home quickly before we get found out more.”

“Okay!”

Seo-jun was thrilled.

He already had people who recognized him, even though he wasn’t as famous as his hyungs. Of course, he was a bit doubtful.

His heart was pounding.

The feeling of being noticed by others! He loved it!

The house he returned to with Seo Eun-hye was a mess.

Only the bedroom was tidy.

The living room and kitchen were half-filled with boxes of stuff.

“We’re leaving the house to Eun-chan. This is how much we have to pack, even though we only took what we needed.”

“Wow!”

Seo-jun lifted up his Lich King doll. Seo-eun-hye smiled.

“You packed your doll well, too.”

“Yup!”

Seo-jun hugged his Lich King doll tightly and smiled brightly. His parents’ eyes were different when they looked at the doll.

Somehow, his parents seemed more relaxed.

Seo-jun was happy, too.

A week later, seo-jun left for America.

***

“Seo-jun, Aunt Na-ra is here!”

“Auntie!”

Seo-jun turned his head from the window, where he was waving his hands vigorously at the passing people.

Kevin’s Noona, na-ra, was standing at the entrance, waving her hand. Seo-jun ran over and gave Na-ra Kim a high-five.

It had been four years since he came to America.

Lee Seo-jun, 58 months old.