After I released some pent up resentment on Hajun, I returned to the cafeteria to look for Dohyun. Luckily I quickly found him slouched over beside a fiery red ball of hair that belonged to Aidan.
As I walked over to the table, I could see Dohyun's expression that had the usual blank expression he always has. I sat down at the table while Daeho asked me what I had done when I left. I turned to him and vaguely told him, "Don't worry about it, I just dealt with something." He didn't seem to want to press further as he just nodded in reply.
Then, I looked at Dohyun and asked, "Hey Dohyun, do you have time to talk after lunch?" He looked up from his tray to look at me before silently nodding.
As I waited for him to finish eating, the cafeteria gradually emptied out, leaving only our group in the room. It was pretty awkward sitting there as the others were not so sneakily glancing at Dohyun as they passed the time.
It seemed like the pressure got to him as he abruptly placed his utensils down, taking a deep breathe before saying, "Okay guys, we can talk about it now..."
"Hey- are you okay man? I can't believe someone could say that to you!" Aidan immediately burst, unable to contain his concern. We all chuckled at his somewhat overenthusiastic nature but I then looked at Dohyun to see his reply.
He smiled a bit and started explaining his current feelings, "Okay, first of all, I'd like to just say that I'm really okay. I just came to lunch late because I had to be interviewed."
"Wait- Interview? Was it about what happened during your practice?" I asked him, causing him to nod in response.
"Yeah it was, and honestly I didn't care too much, that guy's probably not doing good in the mental health department if he couldn't stop himself from exploding on day 4." Dohyun casually continued, it really did seem like he was indifferent to the situation.
"I guess that means they're gonna air what he said to you? I guess his time on this show is done for then." Daeho chimed in.
After that, Aidan suddenly shouted, "Okay guys! Group hug time!" I could see Dohyun visibly cringe at Aidan as he started to back away from the table.
Unluckily for Dohyun, everyone decided to play along with Aidan and started to surround him. After a minute of fighting, Dohyun eventually gave up and was suffocated by the 6 people crowded around him.
Following that, I checked the time to see that our break time was basically over, which prompted me to remind the group to go back to their practice rooms, after Aidan's insistence on doing another group cheer.
As we walked to the practice rooms, I felt drained for some reason even though I hadn't done much today. When we reached the room, I opened the door to a gloomy atmosphere. I walked over to Jiho and asked what had happened.
"Well... I don't want to alarm you, but they pushed forward the mentor check-in so we only have an hour to practice now." Jiho anxiously told me.
My jaw dropped, this completely wrecked our plans. We were definitely not prepared for the mentors' review. As I didn't want to waste anymore time, I quickly told everyone that we'd have a change of plans, instead of the 3 groups we'd split into earlier, I decided that we'd have to settle on splitting into 2 groups instead and practice side by side.
Everyone agreed and the practice quickly ensued. Jiho and Sunghoon told me that they had practiced more in advance so they'd watch over all of us instead. I thanked them for their generosity as I tried to shake off the bad feeling in my stomach swallowing me whole.
Since we'd needed some time to organize ourselves, we realistically had less than one hour for practice. This was a detriment to our group, we hadn't pushed that far ahead of our schedule so we were feeling extremely rushed, which caused a more sloppy group practice than earlier.
As we ended our 2nd run. I looked toward Jiho and Sunghoon whose faces were plastered with troubled expressions.
After a moment of silence, Jiho started to speak, "Okay... honestly, I can't say that you guys have gotten any much better than the first time. I still see the same mistakes, I think we might have no choice but to split up again."
Sunghoon nodded before adding on, "I agree, it's too difficult to pick out everyone's mistakes like this."
I bit my lip as I was the one who decided that it'd be better to be in a bigger group but I shook off my guilt as I suggested another idea. "How about we just pair weaker and stronger people together? I think one-on-one practice would save some time."
Jiho and Sunghoon looked at me before agreeing, after which they picked out who would be paired together. As they called out names, the trainees immediately picked a spot to start practicing. As my name was called, I was paired with Minho, who was stronger in dance than me.
By the time we'd been called, we had half an hour left to practice, I tried to calm down my nerves and focus as Minho started his performance first.
After his display, he caught his breathe while looking at me, asking what I thought. I processed my thoughts for a moment before telling him that he should lower the key on the high notes.
"Are you sure? Someone got scolded by mentor Suri for lowering the key..." He told me hesitantly.
I shook my head before replying, "That was because he did it for the entire song, it should be fine if you just do it at the high notes. I think it's worse to sound completely off-key than to lower it to something you can manage."
"Hm... I guess that's true, Jiho hyung told me the same thing too." He replied. I was a bit confused on why he didn't follow Jiho's advice first but I shrugged it off.
After this, it was now my turn to sing and dance. Although my dance had increased to B-, I still felt like I was lacking too much. When I compared my dance to Minho, I could feel that my movements weren't as impactful, it was probably due to my lack of experience more than anything but it still didn't feel great.
After I finished, Minho gave me his opinions, "Hyung I think you're too focused on what you need to do next when you dance, I think you should be more confident in your movements because I can tell that you're hesitating every now and then."
I nodded intently, I had heard this feedback before, but it was really difficult to stop overthinking my movements, which I then asked Minho how I could fix.
Minho thought for a moment before saying, "Just think about how water always flows, even if you do think about the next move, you can also keep in mind how you'll connect your current movement to flow better."
After that, I tried to follow his suggestion, I still felt somewhat awkward but I did think it helped as I couldn't help myself from thinking too much. I started to loosen up as we continued practicing as I'd felt we'd made enough progress as a duo to not embarrass ourselves in front of the mentors, though I felt it'd be quite difficult if they make us dance in a group.
While I was discussing with Minho, the dreaded moment arrived, the sound of knocking caught everyone's attention as the door slowly opened.