Lesson Two

Deal?

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

IT was the twentieth day in the month of December. Jungkook impatiently waited for the brat—who was now his vocal coach—to open the door of her section as he rang the bell for the second time.

Well, Yoongi's section of the house.

Jungkook worked out the solution he had come up with to save himself from about numerous times in his head. It resulted in a rather queer expression forming on his face because when Yoona opened the door, she had a rather concerned look on her face.

"Are you feeling unwell?"

"Oh!" Jungkook said, jerking awake from his thoughts. "I am fine."

"Are you sure about that?"

"Pretty sure. Why? Were you worried about me?" A look of mischief replaced the former following the question.

"Oh, har har. In your dreams, bozo," Yoona said, her sympathetic look quickly melting into a scowl. "Get inside."

Jungkook stepped inside the section of Yoongi, which was all too familiar to him and proceeded towards his studio. He noticed that Yoona had moved most of the music instruments towards the sides and placed the mic in the center. There was a small speaker on the table where Yoongi had kept his big computer, and his automatic reclining chair was pushed close to the wall.

He pulled one of the stools in the corner and sat down in front of the mic. Yoona hadn't entered the room yet, so he waited for her patiently.

When she came in, she was holding a tray of two glasses of water. She approached him and motioned him to take one. He picked one up and immediately kept it back.

"It's so bloody hot!" He exclaimed.

"It's supposed to be, idiot. You should always drink hot water before singing. It clears the throat. Didn't you know?"

"Of course I did. Only I drink lukewarm water instead of boiling hot water," he retorted.

She sneered and thrust the glass of water into his hands.

"Drink it. Only then will we start the lesson," she insisted.

Jungkook sighed and put the glass down on the floor.

"Okay, I'm going to get straight to the point. I will give you my review of your lessons by the end of six months. It will be good, I promise. However, my condition is that you let me off these lessons so that I can have the free time I deserve, and so can you. Neither of us will have to face each other and ruin our day. Since you obviously hate me, won't this be a plus point for you? Plus, I don't really need these lessons. They're absolutely useless for someone like me."

If he could hear himself, Jungkook sounded like a real estate agent, not an entertainer.

Yoona stared at him for a few minutes silently. Then, she burst into a fit of cackles that stunned Jungkook into silence.

"What is so funny?" Jungkook asked, getting annoyed while Yoona continued cackling.

"Jeon Jungkook, what gave you the impression that I hated you?" She said, smiling for the first time in his presence. To his utter astonishment, he found the smile strikingly similar to Yoongi's.

"I thought you did because—"

"Because I had that stupid argument with you in the van? Seriously?" Yoona snorted.

He gaped at her, as if she were some exotic wildlife on display in a zoo. She didn't possess the shy laughter her brother did or any other sane person. Strangely, he found that it fit her like a glove.

"However, it's too late to back out of this. I didn't take up the contract just for the review. I took it for the experience. I don't like depending on people. I want to feel what it feels like to teach something I know. So I can share the knowledge I have, limited though it may be. I took it for the joy I get from teaching and not for the money.

"So, there's no way I'm accepting your offer, Jeon," Yoona ended her little speech with a smile.

Jungkook knew that he was doomed.

For that very smile was usually displayed by Min Yoongi, and it somehow turned all his bandmates into eager dogs willing to curry favors. Jungkook, rebellious as he pretended to be, feared that dangerous smile and was now afraid of succumbing to its female version.

"What the fuck, Min!" Jungkook yelled in pure frustration.

"Language."

"Language, you're telling me? You're supposed to call me oppa, brat!"

"Yeah, yeah. Now drink that glass of water. It must have become 'lukewarm' by now."

•

"We'll be starting off with you singing a song," Yoona said.

Puzzled, Jungkook voiced his query.

"Excuse me? But I thought that you would be making me do some vocal warm-ups or something like that."

"I've heard your songs. Your covers. Your voice is quite well developed. However, I can't judge how you really sing until I hear you sing in front of me. The studio version, nay, even the live version, cannot be trusted. My ears alone can guide me so that I can provide some guidance."

"Oh, alright. That makes sense."

Jungkook closed his eyes and sang, failing to get her to get up from her place and start playing the keys of the song on the small organ that Yoongi kept in the corner of his room.

The soft notes coming from the organ reminded him of Yoongi's playing, and he opened his eyes to see that she was still playing it, even after he stopped singing. Her fingers seemed to caress the keys, the way a lover would touch the face of their beloved. She breezily played the ending and looked up at him.

"That was really, really nice. I did expect something incredible, but not to such an extent."

He gave a little jerk of his head to politely accept the praise, although he could feel his ears burning slightly.

'Curse you, damn hormones.'

"However, I did notice you dodge some notes in the lower range. Why is that?

Biting his lip consciously, he pondered on the question for a minute before answering it.

"I don't actually know. I guess it's something to do with how I was trained before debut or maybe because it's become pretty habitual for me. I don't have much confidence in my lower register."

Yoona tutted. "I don't think so. Is it because your comfort zone doesn't exactly involve singing in bass? But I thought you also rapped a bit in the past too, right? Have you never attempted singing in your lower register after the initial few years of debut?"

Jungkook shook his head. "A few times, for the background vocals, mostly. But not as part of the chorus or the verses. Mostly just the little ad-libs in the hooks and the bridge."

"Hm, let's try singing it a pitch lower then, shall we?" Yoona offered, and before he knew it, Jungkook found himself fetching Yoongi's guitar that was propped against a corner of the wall and handing it to her.

Strumming it to get the perfect pitch, she hummed to herself for a while and then finally, she began to sing.

The little performance lasted just a little over a minute, but Jungkook found himself completely mesmerized in that brief period.

Even though her singing voice betrayed her American accent, she still managed to pronounce the Korean words correctly, revealing a residual dialect of her hometown. Her voice was delicate, and emotions flowed eloquently through it.

While her brother's rap left him stunned, her vocals left him bewitched.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.