Closed-Door Meeting — Neon Pulse
The slide refreshes.
ECLIPSE GIRLS × KIRI 547
Distilled Precision.
Age-gated: 25+
The bottle is unmistakable now — clear glass, sharp typography, the eclipse graphic swallowing the sun just enough to feel symbolic without ever being accused of it.
No warnings.
No moral language.
Just control.
The PR director speaks evenly, as if reading market weather.
“They set it at twenty-five. Old enough to signal adulthood. Young enough to keep the conversation cultural, not cautionary.”
One of the girls exhales sharply, shaking her head.
“So it’s not about drinking.”
“No,” the director replies. “It’s about who survives the night intact.”
The receipts resurface again online:
timestamped
cropped just enough
logos visible
commentary doing the rest
Mara still hasn’t said a word.
She doesn’t need to.
The Exploitation (Still Indirect)
Eclipse Girls begin appearing everywhere.
Editorials.
Nightlife features.
Backstage photography.
Always the same visual rule:
one bottle
one glass
untouched
The image repeats until it becomes language.
The message circulates without ever being stated:
We know our limits.
We stay standing.
There is no reference to Jiyeon.
No reference to the case.
But the timing does the talking.
Jiyeon’s Realisation
Jiyeon stares at the eclipse logo longer than she should.
The sun isn’t destroyed.
It’s obscured — temporarily.
That’s when it lands.
Mara isn’t trying to erase her.
She’s positioning herself as what comes after.
Final Decision
The legal advisor closes the file.
“There’s nothing to sue,” he says.
“Nothing to rebut.”
A pause.
“If we react, we become part of her narrative.”
Silence fills the room again.
Then Jiyeon speaks — not defensive, not shaken.
Resolved.
“Then survival is the counter-campaign.”
No statements.
No interviews.
No emotional corrections.
Just presence.
Just endurance.
Outside, the headlines accelerate.
Inside, Neon Pulse chooses to outlast them.
The back shop was their unofficial headquarters.
Downstairs, past the deli counter and through the garden gates, where the koi pond burbled softly like it didn’t know anything about charts or court dates. The smell of bread and herbs drifted in from the kitchen. Someone had left the back door open just enough for the air to move.
Lucas, Klaya, and Imogen were already there, plates pushed aside, phones out, grocery order half-written and forgotten.
“This is where leaks come to die,” Imogen muttered, scrolling furiously. “Except this one apparently took a taxi.”
Lucas leaned back on the bench. “You don’t leak something that clean by accident.”
Klaya nodded. “It’s curated. Someone wanted Clancy to notice.”
The gate creaked.
Noah, Lumi, and Ji-yeon slipped in like they’d been summoned by instinct rather than text, food in hand, shoulders dropping the moment they crossed into the space.
“Please tell me this is the eating kind of meeting,” Lumi said.
“It’s the complaining kind,” Imogen replied. “Sit.”
Ji-yeon did, exhaling. “Let me guess. Eclipse Girls.”
“Why now?” Imogen shot back. “Why this?”
Ji-yeon didn’t dodge it. “Because Mara’s had the alcohol deal lined up for a long time.”
That got everyone’s attention.
“You don’t hand out free bottles like that without backing,” Ji-yeon continued. “How do you think she always had money? How she kept lacing rooms with it? She tried Apex Prism first. They weren’t for it.”
“So she went elsewhere,” Noah said quietly.
“And now,” Ji-yeon added, “she’s adding fuel to my fire. I’ve got court dates stacking up, Christmas coming, New Year right behind it. Perfect time to market alcohol.”
Imogen slammed her phone down. “She’s using you.”
“Yes,” Ji-yeon said calmly. “And the girls.”
Lucas frowned. “Still doesn’t answer who leaked.”
Imogen sighed. “We know Strike was approached.”
That landed oddly — not explosive, just heavy.
“He was poached again,” Lumi said. “Mara tried to pull him off the Neon Pulse collab.”
“And?” Klaya asked.
“And he tipped us off,” Imogen said. “Which is how we know.”
Ji-yeon smiled faintly. “That’s new.”
Noah scrolled, then snorted. “Also — her group? They’re older trainees. The ones that never made final cut.”
“That company was bleeding,” Ji-yeon said. “Too dependent on their majors. Everyone’s maturing, going solo. They needed her.”
Imogen tilted her head. “They’re not that much older than us.”
She held up her phone, Lumi’s tagged screenshots lighting up the table.
Claire, who’d arrived quietly and taken a seat near Ji-yeon, leaned in. “You should be okay through the court case.”
Ji-yeon looked at her.
“You did the right thing,” Claire continued gently. “You’re protected under your exclusive contract. While you’re in the group, they can’t do much. The group has to function.”
Ji-yeon nodded. “I know. I’m lucky.” She glanced around the table. “I’ve got you guys.”
A beat.
“And,” she added softly, “Strike. He’s helping.”
Imogen raised an eyebrow. “Not seeing him though.”
“Not until January,” Ji-yeon said. “Court first. Industry reset after.”
Lucas grinned. “Classic. Everyone waits.”
Lumi tossed a piece of bread into her mouth. “That’s the thing people forget. The industry doesn’t rush forever.”
Outside, the koi stirred lazily.
Inside, the girls laughed — not because it was funny, but because they knew how to keep going.
And somewhere, just beyond the garden gate, the waiting had already begun.
Lou learned, over time, that coordination wasn’t about calendars. It was about knowing where the weight was.
She sat at her desk with three schedules open, a fourth handwritten because she trusted pen more than software when things got complicated. Jeju in winter looked simple on paper. In reality
🧡Jeju Island
Lou booked it under three different innocuous headings—wellness, staff rest, family accommodation—because the industry didn’t respect honesty; it respected plausible paperwork.
The resort’s real name didn’t appear in any public-facing brochure. That was precisely why she chose it.
Seabrook Haneul Retreat sat above the winter shoreline, a low sprawl of basalt stone and timber that looked as though it had been there longer than any trend cycle. Wind worried the grass along the paths. The sea stayed slate-dark and restless, like it had its own timetable and no interest in theirs.
Lou arrived first.
She always did.
Her role wasn’t visibility. It was absorption—taking friction before anyone else had to touch it.
Clancy messaged shortly after landing in Japan: her side of the perimeter secured, Ji-yeon and Strike tucked neatly outside the Korean holiday circuit. Present in the way that read as ordinary. Boring, even.
Lou didn’t ask for details. She didn’t need them. She needed the shape of containment, not its texture.
Then the arrivals began—uncoordinated by design. No convoy worth photographing. Just a quiet procession of luggage, winter coats, and people visibly exhaling the moment they crossed the threshold.
Claire and Evan came in first, understated, like they were returning to somewhere already familiar. Evan paused in the entryway, watching Lushii—Eli’s cat—survey the new space with cool disdain, tail upright, eyes narrowed as if judging the architecture on principle.
“Lushii’s already decided this place is inadequate,” Evan murmured.
Claire smiled faintly.
“She’ll soften once someone opens a snack.”
Eli, Dominic and Uriel followed, mid-argument, neither of them breaking stride.
“It’s an island,” Eli insisted, gesturing vaguely.
“It’s a mood,” Uriel countered. “At best.”
“It’s both.”
“It’s neither. It’s marketing.”
Lou let it pass. That was their rhythm.
Then Jaylen and Imogen arrived—windbrisk, laughing, carrying too much motion for the calm of the lobby. Not disruptive. Just alive in a way that resisted stillness without rejecting it.
Imogen took in the space immediately, eyes sharp, expression thoughtful.
“Okay,” she said, approving. “This has taste. Basalt. Minimal. Pretends it’s not expensive.”
Jaylen’s mouth curved.
“It is expensive.”
“It’s pretending,” she replied, like that distinction mattered.
Lou noted it without comment: Imogen could relax here. Which meant Jaylen wouldn’t have to perform ease—he could simply exist beside her.
Lucas arrived last, Kayla close at his side. Not hidden, but not announced either—newly attached at the edges of the group’s orbit, like a second coat thrown over the shoulders without much thought.
Lou’s stomach tightened a fraction.
Not disapproval.
Policy awareness.
The company didn’t like what it couldn’t label quickly.
“Lou,” Lucas said, careful, respectful. “Kayla’s just here for the first two nights.”
“Of course,” Lou replied, as if it had always been part of the plan. “I already cleared it.”
Kayla met her gaze—grateful, a little unsure. Lou held eye contact exactly long enough to communicate the terms clearly, without softness or threat.
Don’t make me regret it, and I won’t.
Then she turned back to the arrivals list in her head, already adjusting the perimeter.
Winter had settled in.
And for now, everything was exactly where it needed to be.
Early Days, Winter Quiet
Jeju Island in winter didn’t ask questions.
That was the first thing Jalen noticed.
The wind came in from the sea with no interest in who you were or what you’d done before. It moved across the basalt stone like it had been doing that forever, flattening noise, dulling urgency. Even the resort—quiet, unnamed in any way that mattered—seemed designed for people who didn’t want to explain themselves.
Jalen liked that.
He and Imogen walked the perimeter path late on the second afternoon, after the families had settled into their own rhythms. The light was already thinning, the kind of grey that made everything feel paused rather than ending. Imogen had her hands in her coat pockets, scarf loose, hair caught by the wind and left there.
They weren’t touching.
Not because they didn’t want to.
Because they were still learning where to put things.
“This is… actually good,” Imogen said, after a stretch of silence that didn’t feel like one.
Jalen nodded. “Yeah.”
She glanced sideways at him, a half-smile. “You’re not trying to turn it into a joke.”
“I don’t feel like ruining it.”
“Growth,” she said lightly.
They kept walking.
Jalen had spent a long time pretending he didn’t know what timing felt like.
Back during the Montauk break, he’d told himself it was about logistics. Group dynamics. Professional sense. Respect. All true, technically. But incomplete.
Back then, Imogen had been orbiting Lukus—history tangled up with familiarity, with the kind of shared past that doesn’t go quietly. Jalen had clocked it immediately. He always did. He just didn’t always act on it.
There had been the baseball thing.
He smiled now, thinking about it.
She’d complained the whole way through the first game. About the rules. The pacing. The uniforms. About how everyone pretended to understand what was happening when they clearly didn’t.
“You don’t even like baseball,” he’d said, then.
“I don’t like men explaining baseball,” she’d shot back.
And then—inevitably—she’d learned it.
Not casually. Not halfway. She’d mastered it the way she mastered anything she decided was worth conquering: statistics, player histories, strategy. She didn’t become a fan. She became competent. Which was worse for everyone else.
Jalen had watched that happen and felt something settle, slow and dangerous.
Because it wasn’t about baseball.
It was about her.
About how she didn’t have to like something to take it seriously. About how she met the world on her own terms and still learned its language well enough to dismantle it if she chose.
Back then, though, he’d held back.
Because of Locked.
Because of the group.
Because Mara had been everywhere in those days, threading people together and pulling them apart with equal precision. The movie press tour she’d built around Imogen had been impressive on paper and suffocating in practice. Jalen had watched Imogen navigate it—sharp, fast, always performing competence—while Lukus hesitated at the edges, pulled this way and that, easily influenced, easily preyed on when it came to attention and approval.
Jalen hadn’t liked how Lukus let things happen.
Hadn’t liked how Imogen carried more than she should have had to.
But he hadn’t stepped in.
Not his place, he’d told himself.
And that had been true. Then.
They stopped at the low stone wall overlooking the sea. Waves broke below them, white against dark water. Imogen leaned forward slightly, forearms resting on the stone, gaze unfocused.
“You were careful,” she said suddenly.
Jalen blinked. “About what?”
“About me,” she said, not looking at him. “Back then.”
He exhaled slowly. “Yeah.”
She waited. He appreciated that she always did.
“I didn’t want to be another complication,” he said. “And Lukus… you had history. I wasn’t going to step into that just because I felt something.”
She nodded. “You stepped back.”
“I stayed where I could still see you,” he corrected. “That was the compromise.”
She turned then, really looking at him. “You could’ve made a move.”
“I know.”
“And you didn’t.”
“I didn’t.”
The wind moved between them, tugging at Imogen’s scarf. Jalen reached out instinctively, adjusted it, then let his hand fall back to his side. Still early. Still learning.
“I didn’t know what to do with the movie stuff,” she said quietly. “Mara built it, but she didn’t… leave room for me in it. I was always reacting.”
“I could tell,” Jalen said. “You were good at it. Too good.”
Imogen snorted. “Story of my life.”
They stood there for a while longer, the conversation settling into something unspoken but understood.
It was later that night—after dinner, after the families had retreated into their own clusters—that they finally talked about the delicatessen.
They sat side by side on the low bench outside their cottage, mugs warming their hands. Lights from the main building glowed softly through the trees. Somewhere inside, Lumi laughed—unmistakable, bright, followed by Jemin’s quieter response.
“I saw Lukus,” Jalen said eventually. “Last time. At the back of the deli.”
Imogen stiffened only slightly. Not enough to miss if you weren’t looking for it.
“With Kayla,” she said.
“Yeah.”
They didn’t rush this part.
“They were close,” Jalen continued. “Not hiding it. Comfortable.”
Imogen stared out toward the dark. “Good.”
He glanced at her. “You mean that?”
“I do,” she said. “Even if… even if there are things I don’t love about how Lukus handled things. Or how easily he let himself be pulled around back then. I don’t want him stuck in that version of himself forever.”
Jalen nodded. “I don’t either.”
She looked at him then, expression softer. “You didn’t have to make space for that.”
“I wanted to,” he said. “If we’re doing this—” he gestured vaguely between them, “—I don’t want ghosts hanging around unacknowledged.”
She smiled faintly. “This is us acknowledging them?”
“Feels like it.”
They clinked mugs, lightly. Not a toast. Just punctuation.
This was their first holiday together.
Not announced. Not curated. No schedules taped to the fridge. No managers checking in every hour. Family close enough to ground things, far enough not to intrude.
They kept their boundaries.
Separate mornings sometimes. Long walks alone. No need to be seen as a unit every second. They were careful not because they were unsure—but because they were.
Early days deserved space.
On one of the last mornings before they’d have to leave—before the slow return toward New Year and its inevitable tightening—Imogen found Jalen already awake, sitting outside with a notebook he wasn’t writing in.
“Thinking?” she asked.
“Letting things line up,” he said.
She sat beside him, shoulder brushing his. This time, neither of them pulled away.
“You still okay with this being… quiet?” she asked.
He smiled. “I think I needed quiet to realize what was loud.”
She laughed softly. “Figures.”
They sat there, Jeju Island cold and steady around them, the sound of the sea doing what it had always done. Somewhere nearby, family stirred. Somewhere far away, the industry waited.
But here, for now, there was just this.
Early days.
Winter.
And the rare permission to move forward without erasing what came before.
Claire noticed it in the margins.
Not in the laughter—there was plenty of that—but in where people chose to stand.
Her family had settled easily into the guest wing, Eli already half-adopted by the cat, who treated him like familiar furniture. They were content, self-sufficient, warm without needing her constant presence. Claire drifted back toward the main kitchen instead, drawn by the sound of Jaylen cooking like he had something to prove to the stove.
He did, apparently.
Pans moved fast. Aromas layered. He talked with his hands, narrated nothing, focused completely. Imogen hovered nearby, stealing tastes, commenting loudly, then wandering off mid-sentence only to circle back again. Jaylen never rushed her. He just adjusted his pace around hers.
Jemin’s mother stood a little apart at first, attentive without intruding. Claire watched her watch the group—how her eyes lingered on her son, who moved quietly through the space, helpful without announcing himself. There was something observant and contained about Jemin that made more sense once his mother was there: accomplished, self-possessed, clearly used to carrying a great deal alone.
Claire realised then that the older guest she’d met back in Montauk—the one with the sharp questions and sharper listening—hadn’t been incidental at all. A close family friend. Academic. A world Jemin had grown up adjacent to, even if he rarely spoke about it.
That context softened things.
Jemin’s mother gravitated toward Lumi naturally. Not in a parental way, but as one career woman recognising another. Their conversation took on a quick, bright rhythm—mutual respect, light challenge. Claire smiled to herself. She remembered hearing they used to argue ferociously once upon a time. Debate, noise, brilliance colliding. Two great minds enjoying the friction.
It felt… right.
Imogen, meanwhile, had found herself seated beside Jemin’s mother, legs tucked up, hands moving as she spoke—about work, about schedules, about how relentless things had become and how she loved it anyway. She asked, sincerely, what it had been like raising a talented boy alone.
Jaylen watched from across the room.
Claire caught it then—the way his attention never clipped her wings. He adored her without corralling her. Let her take the centre, trusted she’d return. Imogen had always been loud, always loved attention, but she followed through. She always had. Years of dance practice, elite schools, discipline disguised as chaos. She’d once been easily pulled into Lukus’s orbit, spun around by someone else’s indecision.
Now she looked grounded.
Joyful, even.
The others laughed, cooked, cleaned as they went. No one waited to be told what to do. The other parents hadn’t arrived yet, and there was space because of it—space to observe, to settle, to imagine this configuration holding.
Claire felt it then: abundance.
The quiet certainty that this dynamic—complex, opinionated, affectionate—might actually work.
And for once, she let herself just stand there, hands wrapped around a mug, and watch it happen.
A Night of Charades (Lucas Missing, Not Missed)
Lucas was nowhere to be found.
This was, unanimously, considered a blessing.
They set up in the main lounge after dinner, fire low, shoes kicked off, the kind of evening that felt accidental in the best way. Someone—no one remembered who—suggested charades. Someone else groaned. Ten minutes later, they were all in.
The six of them: Claire, Evan, Jaylen, Imogen, Lumi, and Jemin.
Rules were agreed upon loosely and immediately broken.
Lumi volunteered to go first, already laughing before the card was even unfolded.
“Okay, okay—English only, right?” she said, waving the slip.
Jemin nodded solemnly. “English. Yes. I understand English.”
He absolutely did not intend to stick to it.
Lumi stepped into the center and immediately mimed… something involving a dramatic cape swirl, a fall to one knee, and an exaggerated gasp.
Jaylen squinted. “Shakespeare?”
Imogen: “No, it’s giving… Victorian drama?”
Evan, deadpan: “Midlife crisis.”
Lumi pointed at Evan like he’d committed a crime, then mimed writing, then dramatically throwing papers in the air.
Claire blinked. “A… writer?”
Lumi nodded furiously, then pretended to stab herself with a quill.
Jemin burst out laughing and yelled, in Japanese, “Ah! That one sad poet guy!”
Imogen stared at him. “That helps no one.”
Jaylen snapped his fingers. “Romeo?”
Lumi froze, then clapped. “YES. Romeo!”
Evan frowned. “That was not Romeo.”
“It was emotionally Romeo,” Lumi said, sitting down triumphantly.
Next up: Jemin.
He took the card, read it, and immediately said, in Korean, “Ah. This is difficult.”
“English,” Lumi reminded him, pointing.
“Yes. English,” Jemin said seriously. Then switched to Japanese. “But how do you explain this with body?”
He stood, thought for a moment, then mimed holding a sword… stopped… shook his head… mimed holding a microphone… stopped again… then crossed his arms and stared intensely into the distance.
Imogen tilted her head. “Is he… judging us?”
Jaylen: “Is this my dad?”
Claire, hesitant: “Is it… a leader?”
Jemin shook his head violently. Then mimed playing guitar. Then abruptly dropped to the floor and pretended to faint.
Lumi screamed laughing. “WHY ARE YOU DYING?”
Jemin, still on the floor, said in Korean, “Because the concept is heavy.”
Evan covered his face. “I don’t even know what category we’re in.”
Jaylen snapped again. “Rock star?”
Jemin sat up instantly and pointed. “YES. But… tragic.”
Imogen leaned forward. “Dead rock star?”
Jemin paused, considered, then nodded slowly. “Emotionally, yes.”
The card was revealed: Vampire Rockstar.
Silence.
Then chaos.
“That is NOT FAIR,” Lumi shouted.
“That is genre blending,” Claire said, laughing.
Imogen clapped. “Honestly? Points for vibes.”
Imogen went next and immediately chose violence.
She mimed high heels. Then a runway walk. Then stopped, pulled an invisible phone from her pocket, and pretended to scroll with exaggerated boredom.
Jaylen groaned. “This is about us, isn’t it?”
Imogen ignored him, mimed cameras flashing, then dramatically ducked behind an imaginary coat rack.
Claire laughed. “Fashion week?”
Imogen shook her head, then pointed at Jaylen and pretended to zip her mouth shut.
Jaylen stared. “What did I do?”
Evan: “Exist?”
Lumi gasped. “A secret relationship?”
Imogen froze, then pointed at Lumi like she’d won a prize.
Jemin clapped. “Ah! Scandal!”
The card: Hidden Couple.
Jaylen buried his face in his hands. “This game is rigged.”
By the time Evan’s turn came around, the rules had fully dissolved.
He mimed a spreadsheet.
Everyone groaned.
“No,” Evan said. “Wait.”
He mimed calming people down. Then setting boundaries. Then quietly exiting the room.
Claire smiled. “You.”
Imogen: “That’s literally just you.”
Lumi: “Is the answer ‘tired’?”
Evan revealed the card without ceremony: Mediator.
Jemin nodded approvingly. “Accurate.”
The night ended without keeping score.
Lumi lay half on the floor, laughing too hard to breathe.
Jemin switched freely between Korean and Japanese, recounting the emotional injustice of his prompts.
Imogen leaned into Jaylen’s shoulder without thinking.
Claire watched it all, content.
Evan refilled mugs.
Lucas never did show up.
No one went looking.
And somehow, without planning it, the night became one of those memories that would be referenced later as if it had always mattered more than it seemed at the time.
By the time the house settled, it did so all at once.
Doors clicked softly. Footsteps thinned. Laughter retreated down corridors and became memory instead of sound. The kitchen lights dimmed to their overnight glow, and the retreat exhaled into something older and quieter.
Evan’s room faced the sea.
Not directly—nothing here demanded that kind of attention—but enough that the window caught the movement of it. Slate water, barely visible in the dark, the suggestion of waves rather than detail. The cold pressed politely against the glass, as if it understood where it was allowed to exist.
Claire slipped off her coat and hung it on the back of the chair without thinking. It was an unconscious claim, the kind that made a room feel briefly like home. Evan noticed. He always did.
Eli’s cat wasn’t there.
That absence was its own small quiet. The bed lay undisturbed, blankets unclaimed, no indignant fur asserting jurisdiction. Somewhere down the corridor, Eli’s door would be closed, the cat already curled into a familiar shape against familiar people.
“Well,” Evan said lightly, toeing off his shoes, “this is new.”
Claire smiled. “She’s loyal to her person.”
“As she should be,” he said. “I respect that.”
They moved slowly, deliberately unhurried. Outside, the wind traced the edges of the building—not loud enough to dramatize itself, just present. Winter doing what it did best: keeping things honest.
Claire sat on the edge of the bed, sweater still on, hands folded loosely.
“You know,” she said after a moment, “my parents absolutely know.”
Evan leaned against the dresser. “About…?”
“About how rarely I actually sleep at home anymore,” she said. “They didn’t ask. That’s how I know.”
He smiled. “Eli clocked it too.”
“Oh, Eli clocked it immediately,” she replied, amused. “He asked where I usually am now. Not if. Where.”
“And what did you say?”
“I said I was fine.”
Evan laughed quietly. “A classic.”
They shared the look—one of those mutual understandings that didn’t need unpacking. This wasn’t secrecy. Just a life that had shifted its centre of gravity.
Evan opened the bedside drawer, reaching for an extra blanket, then paused.
“Still the same,” he said.
Claire glanced over. “What is?”
“The drawer,” he replied, nudging it open slightly. “Extra charger. Hair tie. Your socks.”
She laughed softly. “You keep those like evidence.”
“I keep them like inevitability,” he said. “In case anyone’s still pretending.”
She crossed the room and rested her forehead briefly against his shoulder. The room smelled faintly of timber and clean linen. Winter had pared everything down to essentials.
“Everyone feels… okay,” she said. “Better than okay.”
Evan nodded. “Jaylen’s cooking like it’s a language he’s fluent in now. Imogen’s not bracing. Jemin’s mother sees everything. Lumi’s already been folded into the fabric. And Loushii”
“—is absolutely pretending she’s asleep,” Claire finished.
They smiled.
Claire slid beneath the covers, stretching out, the bed cool but welcoming. Evan followed, settling beside her, the quiet finally complete.
“I like this,” he said softly. “Where no one needs anything from us tonight.”
Claire turned toward him. In the low light, his face looked unguarded.
“I do too,” she said. “It feels earned.”
Outside, the sea kept its distance. Inside, the cold stayed where it belonged—on the other side of the glass.
Somewhere down the hall, Eli’s cat shifted and settled again.
And for the first night, that was enough.
Lou Watching the Room
Lou always knew when a configuration worked by how little she had to intervene.
The second night confirmed it.
Evan’s parents arrived first, just after lunch—quiet, observant, carrying the kind of warmth that didn’t announce itself. They took in the retreat with appreciative restraint, asked sensible questions, complimented the view without exaggeration. People who knew how to enter a space without rearranging it.
Jalen’s parents followed not long after, more animated, coats shrugged off quickly, voices already overlapping as they greeted people they technically hadn’t met but somehow treated like familiar ground. The overlap between the two sets was immediate and unexpected: Evan’s father and Jalen’s father fell into conversation over the logistics of travel and winter roads; the mothers bonded over the kitchen before tea had even finished pouring.
Lou clocked it from the doorway and let herself relax a fraction.
That was rare.
Most of the others had come back late afternoon—hikes completed, muscles overstretched, cheeks windburned, exhaustion worn openly and proudly. Claire moved like someone whose body had done more than it was used to. Evan noticed immediately.
“You’re limping,” he said.
“I am not,” Claire replied, sitting down anyway.
Five minutes later, she had her feet in Evan’s lap, socks half-off, and he was pressing his thumbs into her arches with practiced focus.
“Oh,” she admitted. “Okay. Maybe a little.”
Jalen laughed from the other side of the room. “That trail was personal.”
Imogen groaned theatrically and dropped onto the couch. “My shoulders hate me.”
Jalen didn’t even look at her—just reached back, automatically, and began working tension out of her neck. She leaned into it without comment, eyes closed, satisfied.
The parents watched this with interest rather than judgment.
“That’s efficient,” Jalen’s mother remarked mildly.
Imogen opened one eye. “He’s trained.”
Evan’s mother smiled. “You’ll keep him.”
Jalen coughed. Evan pretended not to hear.
The tree had gone up earlier that afternoon—nothing extravagant, just enough lights to soften the room. Boxes had begun to gather beneath it, placed casually, then adjusted, then adjusted again. Someone—Lou suspected Evan’s father—had already shaken one experimentally.
“That’s cheating,” Claire said.
“That’s curiosity,” he replied.
Laughter followed. Easy. Unforced.
Evan slipped his own present under the tree when he thought no one was watching. Lou saw it anyway. She always did. The box was modest, carefully wrapped, placed not front and center but not hidden either. A statement without performance.
Dinner arrived exactly when it should have.
The catering—quietly exceptional—was handled under Lou’s name, billed as a routine seasonal arrangement. Food that felt home-cooked without anyone having to cook. Tables were set, wine poured, dishes shared and passed without hierarchy.
Lou stood long enough to ensure everything held, then finally sat.
She allowed herself to enjoy it.
The sound of overlapping conversation. Mothers exchanging recipes. Fathers debating routes and weather. Claire relaxed, Evan attentive without hovering. Jalen animated, Imogen glowing, the group settling into something that looked almost… ordinary.
That was when Clancy’s message came through.
Lou didn’t open it immediately. She finished her water. Let the laughter crest and fall.
Then she read.
Ji-yeon's parents.
Conglomerate-side, well-networked, deeply anxious. Pushing quietly but firmly for brand ambassadorships they could influence themselves—outside contract structures, outside counsel. Framing it as protection. Worry. Care.
The press leak—Strike Chaplin’s involvement, framed as steadiness rather than scandal—had eased some of the immediate reputational pressure. The parents were relieved. Too relieved.
They were starting to meddle.
Lou’s jaw tightened almost imperceptibly.
This was how things complicated themselves: civil entanglements creeping in around criminal proceedings, good intentions blurring lines, influence turning into liability. Clancy was handling it, but Clancy was newer. Still learning how to say no to people who had never heard it before.
Lou filed the problem where it belonged: not tonight, but soon.
She’d have to close that perimeter before New Year. Before the music release. Before the court date turned everyone jumpy and reactive.
She sent Clancy one line back.
I’ll take it. Enjoy your holiday.
Then she put the phone away.
After dinner, Lou stood, glass in hand.
“I’ll leave you to it,” she said lightly. “Everything’s set. Travel’s confirmed. I expect to see all of you back in Seoul before New Year—rested.”
There were groans. There were thanks. There were promises made and immediately softened.
She hugged who needed hugging, nodded to the rest, and slipped out before anyone could try to pull her back into the warmth.
From the corridor, she heard laughter swell again.
Good.
Some nights were for holding things together.
Others were for letting them be held.
This one, Lou decided as she stepped into the cold, was the latter.
Coaching the Conversation
Lou didn’t sit in on the call.
That was deliberate.
Instead, she stood two rooms away with her phone face down on the table, coffee cooling beside it, listening only for tone through the thin walls. Clancy was in the smaller meeting room—glass, muted light, nothing ornamental enough to distract from the fact that this was about authority, not affection.
Lou had coached her for exactly twelve minutes beforehand.
No more. No less.
“Three things,” Lou had said, calm as ever.
“Contain their fear. Redirect their competence. Do not argue with their love.”
Clancy had nodded, jaw set. She’d learned by now that Lou never wasted words.
The parents appeared on screen precisely on time.
Well-dressed. Controlled. Faces that had learned how to sit through board meetings without revealing urgency, even when urgency was the only thing present.
Jae-yeon’s mother spoke first.
“We appreciate you taking this call,” she said. “We are… concerned.”
Clancy didn’t rush to reassure. Lou had warned her about that.
“I understand,” Clancy replied. “And I respect that concern.”
The father folded his hands. “Our daughter’s future is being discussed publicly without our consent.”
“That’s true,” Clancy said. “And it’s also temporary.”
A pause.
Lou would’ve smiled at that—temporary was a stabilizing word.
“We are not trying to interfere,” the mother continued carefully. “We are trying to protect her.”
Clancy nodded. “Of course. Any parent would.”
She let the silence do some of the work. Then:
“But protection and positioning are different tools.”
The parents exchanged a glance.
This was the hinge.
Clancy shifted, grounding herself exactly the way Lou had shown her—shoulders relaxed, voice low, pace unhurried.
“Right now,” she said, “any individual brand ambassadorship for Jae-yeon creates a narrative. Even if the brand is respectable. Even if the intention is good.”
“And a narrative can be shaped,” the father said.
“Yes,” Clancy agreed. “But not controlled. Especially not during legal proceedings.”
The mother frowned slightly. “So what are you suggesting? That she waits?”
Clancy shook her head. “No. That she moves with her group.”
She shared her screen.
Lou’s framework appeared—clean, minimal, impossible to misinterpret.
One platform.
Five girls.
Technology, lifestyle, future-facing.
Sleep.
Movement.
Travel rhythm.
Creative focus.
No weight.
No morality.
No correction.
“This,” Clancy said, “keeps your daughter visible without isolating her. Supported without being shielded. It protects her legally and professionally.”
The father leaned closer to the screen. “And her individuality?”
“She keeps it,” Clancy said. “Inside the group. Where it’s strongest.”
That landed.
Lou heard the change in the air even through the wall—the subtle shift from resistance to calculation.
“But we have been approached,” the mother said. “Individually.”
Clancy didn’t flinch. “I know.”
That honesty mattered.
“And we declined to proceed,” Clancy added, “because any contract routed through parents instead of counsel creates risk for Jae-yeon. Civil risk.”
The father’s jaw tightened. He understood that language.
“You are asking us to step back,” he said.
“I’m asking you to step alongside,” Clancy corrected. “Governance works best when everyone stays in their lane.”
The mother exhaled slowly. “And you can guarantee this protects her?”
Clancy chose her words carefully. Lou had warned her not to promise outcomes—only process.
“I can guarantee,” she said, “that this keeps her from being alone in the frame. And that matters more than any logo right now.”
Another pause.
Longer this time.
Then the mother nodded, once. “She does better in the group.”
“Yes,” Clancy said softly. “She does.”
When the call ended, Clancy stayed seated for a moment longer than necessary, letting the adrenaline drain without chasing it.
Lou appeared in the doorway, unannounced.
“You didn’t over-explain,” Lou said. “Good.”
Clancy let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. “They’re scared.”
“They’re powerful,” Lou replied. “Power is just fear with better posture.”
Clancy smiled faintly. “They agreed.”
“They would,” Lou said. “You gave them dignity without giving them control.”
Clancy leaned back in her chair. “Hero’s not going to love this.”
Lou shrugged. “Hero doesn’t need to love it. He needs to work within it.”
She glanced at her phone, already mentally moving on.
“January stays clean,” Lou continued. “The group stays intact. Jae-yeon stays protected without being infantilized.”
Clancy nodded. “And if the parents push again?”
Lou’s expression softened—just slightly.
“They won’t,” she said. “They’ve been heard. That’s usually enough.”
Lou turned to leave, then paused.
“You did well,” she added, without ceremony.
Clancy watched her go, the weight of the conversation finally settling—not as dread, but as resolve.
The line had held.
And for once, everyone had moved forward
without needing a victory to prove it.
Terms and Timing
Clancy hated how quickly a “simple” family concern turned into three separate calls, two competing narratives, and one person who kept pretending he wasn’t the hinge.
She stood in the service corridor outside the smaller meeting lounge—quiet carpet, soft lighting, the kind of space designed to make conversations feel less consequential than they were. Blue leaned against the wall beside her, phone in hand, posture relaxed in a way that suggested he’d already decided not to be intimidated by anyone.
On the screen: Hero.
Strike Chaplin’s manager.
The name fit him too well. A little too polished. A little too practiced at being helpful.
Clancy glanced at the door, then at Blue. “Are we aligned?”
Blue’s mouth tilted. “We’re aligned. We’re just not emotionally volunteering.”
“That’s the best version of us,” Clancy muttered, and tapped to join.
Hero’s face appeared. Neutral background. Perfect lighting. The gentle smile of someone who believed he was reasonable by default.
“Clancy,” Hero said smoothly. “Blue. Thank you for making time over the holidays.”
Clancy didn’t mirror the warmth. She offered professional gravity instead.
“Let’s keep it clean,” she said. “We’re here to reduce variables.”
Hero nodded, as if that was his goal too.
“Of course,” he replied. “We all want the same thing—stability for Ji-yeon.”
Blue’s eyes flicked to Clancy for a fraction of a second.
Clancy didn’t correct him on pronunciation, because he’d said it right. The spelling mattered internally, but this was not the moment to teach anyone anything unless it served the outcome.
Hero continued, voice still gentle. “Her parents are worried. Understandably. They’re also proactive. They’ve been approached.”
“By you,” Blue said, tone mild.
Hero’s smile held. “By brands. By partners. By people who see an opportunity to support her.”
Clancy kept her voice even. “Support can become pressure. Pressure can become noise. Noise is the last thing Ji-yeon needs before January.”
Hero leaned forward slightly, as if sharing a confidence. “Which is why I’m proposing something modern and unobtrusive. A technology–lifestyle platform. Smart wearables. Sleep. Recovery. Movement. Not weight. Nothing moral. Just… future-facing.”
Clancy didn’t react, because the pitch was familiar.
Lou had already laid it out for her. Not as a suggestion, but as a tool: This is how you give families control without giving them the wheel.
Blue spoke before Clancy could. “You’re proposing a solo ambassadorship.”
Hero’s smile tightened a fraction. “Not necessarily solo. Strike could be involved as well. That’s the elegance of it—cross-market reassurance. A stable association.”
Clancy’s stomach sank—not because she was surprised, but because she understood what Lou had meant when she’d said there were always second hands on the steering wheel.
Hero wasn’t just offering a plan.
He was positioning himself inside it.
“Let’s clarify,” Clancy said, calm. “Why does Strike need an ambassadorship right now?”
Hero’s expression didn’t change. “Because he’s relevant, and because it protects both of them.”
Blue’s laugh was soft and humorless. “Protects?”
Hero’s tone stayed polite. “Associations matter. The public already views Strike and Ji-yeon as controlled and serious. Pairing that with a reputable platform creates… stability.”
Clancy let the silence stretch. Not long enough to turn hostile. Long enough to become uncomfortable.
Then she said what Lou would have said—clean, undeniable, and boring.
“Any move that reads like image engineering before legal proceedings is a liability,” Clancy said. “For Ji-yeon. For Strike. For everyone.”
Hero blinked once, as if she’d surprised him with basic physics.
“That’s why we do it as a lifestyle partnership,” he said. “It’s not a statement. It’s not moral. It’s not defensive.”
Blue shifted off the wall and stepped closer to the door, as if proximity to an exit made it easier to stay polite.
“You’re still building a narrative,” Blue said. “You just want it to look like a product.”
Hero held his gaze through the screen. “Isn’t that what all of you do?”
Clancy didn’t flinch. “We build narratives with consent, within contract, and within timing. Families aren’t brand strategy departments. And third-party managers don’t get to route around governance.”
There it was—the line.
Hero’s smile thinned. “Lou put you on this call?”
“She didn’t have to,” Clancy replied. “This is my perimeter.”
Blue’s eyes narrowed slightly—approval, quiet.
Hero exhaled, as if conceding a small point to keep the larger one alive. “So what are you proposing?”
Clancy glanced down at her notes. Not because she needed them, but because the act of referencing paper reminded everyone this was operational, not emotional.
“One platform,” she said. “Two lanes.”
Hero’s eyebrows lifted.
Clancy continued, precise. “If the platform is right—reputable, audited, stable—and if it’s a January rollout, then we can consider it. But it can’t be a solo shield for Ji-yeon, and it can’t be a joint couple narrative.”
Hero’s smile returned slightly. “And Strike?”
Blue answered this time. “Strike can have a lane. Audio and creative tools. Process. Creation. Work. Not romance. Not protection.”
Clancy nodded. “The girls anchor recovery rhythms—sleep, movement, travel routines. Group positioning. No isolating Ji-yeon.”
Hero leaned back, thoughtful now. Less salesman, more negotiator. “You want to keep them in the same ecosystem but never in the same frame.”
“Yes,” Clancy said.
“And you’ll sell that to her parents?” Hero asked.
Clancy’s voice stayed even. “We won’t sell it. We’ll structure it. Their daughter won’t be sidelined, and she won’t be exposed alone. The platform remains future-facing. Legal optics remain untouched.”
Blue added, almost lazily, “And if they push outside contract, we shut it down.”
Hero’s gaze flicked between them. “You’re confident.”
Clancy didn’t smile. “I’m cautious. Confidence is what gets people in trouble.”
For the first time, Hero’s expression softened into something closer to respect.
“All right,” he said. “Send terms.”
Clancy nodded once. “We will. And Hero?”
“Yes?”
“Don’t use the family as a shortcut,” she said, quietly. “If you want something, ask us. Not them.”
Hero held her gaze for a beat, then inclined his head. “Understood.”
The call ended.
The corridor felt colder afterward—not because the temperature changed, but because Clancy’s adrenaline finally realized it was allowed to exist.
Blue looked at her. “That was good.”
Clancy exhaled, long and slow. “Lou would’ve done it cleaner.”
Blue shrugged. “Lou’s a machine.”
Clancy’s mouth twitched. “Lou’s a person.”
“A terrifying one,” Blue said.
Clancy slipped her phone into her pocket and looked down the quiet hallway—toward the warmth of dinner, toward laughter, toward the illusion that nothing complicated lived under it.
In January, the world would reset without mercy.
But for tonight, she’d held the line.
And Ji-yeon—spelled correctly in every internal document, protected correctly in every external one—would stay exactly where she belonged: inside the group, inside the plan, and out of anyone’s improvised salvation.
By the Fire Pit
The third day settled into its own rhythm.
The guys were gone early—boots by the door, murmured plans, a quick inventory of weather and distance before disappearing into the hills like they’d been waiting for permission to burn off excess energy. The sound of them faded quickly, swallowed by wind and terrain.
The girls stayed.
Wrapped in blankets, clustered around the low fire pit near the resort’s inner courtyard, mugs warming their hands. Hair loose, faces bare, the kind of morning where no one felt observed.
Kayla sat cross-legged on the stone bench, phone face-down beside her like she didn’t quite want to admit how much she knew.
“Well,” she said eventually, dragging the word out, “I probably shouldn’t say this.”
Lumi lit up immediately.
“Oh, you absolutely should.”
Imogen leaned back, grinning. “If it starts with I probably shouldn’t, it’s already too late.”
Kayla laughed, shaking her head. “Okay, but this stays here.”
They all nodded in exaggerated seriousness. No one meant it, but the ritual mattered.
“So,” Kayla continued, “working through Max—styling, fittings, all the side rooms people forget about—you hear things. Not announcements. Just… direction.”
Claire tilted her head. “Direction how?”
“Like,” Kayla said, searching for the right phrasing, “who people are quietly aligning themselves with. And Quincy? She’s realigning her whole ecosystem.”
Lumi sat up straighter. “Haircare?”
Kayla pointed at her. “Haircare. Fashion. Makeup. But not in the usual way. It’s not about faces—it’s about world-building.”
That got a reaction.
Imogen scoffed lightly. “Of course it is.”
Kayla smiled. “Exactly. Eternal Neon Pulse. Youth as abundance, not age. Rituals. Maintenance. Recovery. She wants things that live between performance and rest.”
There was a beat of silence as it landed.
“And,” Kayla added casually, “she thinks Neon Pulse fits. Completely.”
Lumi made a noise that was half-laugh, half-gasp. “You’re joking.”
“I’m not,” Kayla said. “They love the idea that you’re not selling perfection—you’re selling continuation. And Max keeps coming up in those conversations.”
That did it.
“Oh, Max,” Imogen said, hand to her chest dramatically. “That man.”
“He’s unstoppable,” Lumi said, grinning. “He’s like—how does Lou keep finding people like that?”
Claire smiled into her mug. “Max attracts good things. It’s annoying.”
Kayla nodded. “He’s busy. Like, genuinely buried. But no one thinks he’s forgotten about you. If anything, it’s more like—he’s laying groundwork.”
Lumi leaned back, staring up at the pale winter sky. “That’s fine. I like groundwork.”
Imogen laughed. “You say that now.”
“I do,” Lumi insisted. “It means there’s more coming.”
They sat with that for a moment—the warmth of the fire, the quiet confidence of being considered rather than chased.
Imogen broke the silence first. “Lou bringing Max into our orbit is still the best thing that’s ever happened.”
Claire nodded. “Unintentionally brilliant.”
Kayla smiled, watching them. “People trust him. That’s why things keep finding their way back to you.”
Lumi lifted her mug. “To Max,” she declared.
They clinked cups lightly, laughter spilling out again, easy and unguarded.
The fire crackled. Somewhere in the distance, the guys would be halfway up a trail, muscles burning, joking loudly.
Here, for now, it was just warmth, possibility, and the quiet sense that the world was still moving—
and this time, moving with them.
Mara, Counting the Irony
Mara found out the way she always did now.
Not through an announcement.
Through timing.
A quiet briefing note slid across her screen early January—too clean, too controlled, too finished to be accidental. No grand reveal. No hype language. Just a partnership framed as infrastructure. Lifestyle. Continuity.
She read it once.
Then again.
Then laughed—short, sharp, and entirely without humor.
Of course.
A major electronics company. Not flashy enough to invite backlash, not small enough to dismiss. Global. Reputable. The kind of brand that didn’t need idols but understood how to use them as proof of concept.
Sleep.
Health.
Movement.
Travel rhythm.
Creative focus.
Mara leaned back in her chair and stared at the ceiling.
Vampires.
They were reviving themselves as vampires.
Her vampires.
The irony landed all at once, and she actually clapped a hand over her mouth, half-laughing, half-exasperated.
“You don’t sleep,” she muttered to no one. “Except now you do. With data.”
The concept notes kept scrolling.
Circadian rhythm optimization.
Recovery cycles.
Night performance, day regulation.
Mara closed her eyes.
They’d taken the entire mythos and inverted it. Vampires who didn’t burn out. Vampires who tracked rest like it was power. Vampires who survived by sleeping properly.
She exhaled slowly.
Of course Lou had done this.
Not loudly. Not triumphantly. Just… correctly.
What stung wasn’t the brand.
It was the reroute.
Mara recognized the architecture immediately—the exact influence channels she’d tried to access months earlier, now sealed off and repurposed. The family leverage she’d circled. The respectability she’d tried to angle toward Ji-yeon’s parents.
Gone.
Not blocked.
Redirected.
Used against her.
She scrolled again, jaw tightening.
Group positioning.
No solo shielding.
No moral framing.
January reset, no comeback language.
She laughed again, this time longer.
“Oh, that’s cruel,” she said softly. “That’s elegant.”
Her own pitch—careful, deniable, adjacent—had been outgrown without ever being acknowledged. The influence she’d wanted to borrow had been neutralized by governance. Not refusal. Replacement.
And the vampires—
Mara pressed her tongue to the inside of her cheek.
She’d built Eclipse Girls as daylight. Clean. Renewal. Bright hours. Youthful clarity. And here came Neon Pulse, resurrected, nocturnal, undead in aesthetic but clinically optimized in practice.
Vampires who tracked sleep cycles.
Vampires with recovery metrics.
Vampires who knew when to rest.
She snorted. “Unbelievable.”
Her phone buzzed. An internal message.
Press asking if the vampire concept contradicts the health partnership.
Mara stared at it, then typed back:
No contradiction. Evolution.
She paused, then added:
Do not joke about insomnia.
Even irony had limits.
She stood and walked to the window, city grey and awake below her. Somewhere across town—across markets, across governance—Lou would be pretending this wasn’t personal.
Mara knew better.
This wasn’t loud.
This wasn’t revenge.
This was what happened when someone else learned faster.
She’d always believed spectacle won.
Turns out, timing did.
Mara straightened her jacket, already recalibrating. There were still moves left. There always were.
But as she turned back to her desk, one thought lingered—annoying, persistent, almost admiring.
They hadn’t beaten her by being brighter.
They’d beaten her by being boring.
And somehow, that was the sharpest cut of all.