"I don't even like him like that."
That's what I told myself.
And maybe that's what made it worse.
After that first reel, I started noticing him everywhere.
Not because the algorithm was smart.
But because I had started looking.
I didn't search his name every day. That would've felt too desperate.
I just… casually typed "AURORA7 funny moments."
Or "Seo Juhan being awkward."
Or "Seo Juhan soft smile compilation."
Purely for entertainment.
Obviously.
If someone checked my history, it wouldn't look like obsession. It would look like curiosity.
At least that's what I convinced myself.
In school, nothing changed.
I still struggled with maths.
Still forgot to bring the right notebook sometimes.
Still sat quietly during lunch because I didn't always have something interesting to say.
But now I had something in my head.
A small secret world.
During boring lectures, I would imagine random things.
What if he saw me the way he looks at fans in videos?
What if he smiled like that in front of me?
Would I smile back?
Or would I act cold and mature?
I don't know why I always imagined myself acting calm.
In reality, I couldn't even answer attendance properly without my voice shaking.
But in my imagination, I was confident.
That was the dangerous part.
He wasn't just a person on screen anymore.
He was becoming a background character in my daily thoughts.
And the funny thing?
I didn't even listen to their songs properly.
My friends would talk about their favorite tracks, and I would just nod.
I didn't care about albums.
I didn't care about choreography.
I cared about the way he laughed when someone teased him.
I cared about how he clapped softly when other members spoke.
I cared about the way his eyes looked kind in low-quality fan edits.
It sounds stupid when I say it out loud.
I knew nothing about his real personality.
Everything I saw was edited.
Clipped.
Filtered.
Selected.
And still, I built a version of him in my head.
A version that was calm. Gentle. Comforting.
Maybe because I needed someone like that.
At home, things were normal. Not dramatic. Not tragic.
Just ordinary.
Money was always calculated.
New things were always "later."
Concert tickets? Impossible.
Merchandise? Don't even think about it.
Even good earphones felt like a luxury.
So I became a silent fan.
No posters on walls. No public fangirling. No screaming over new releases.
Just me.
And my phone.
And small 20-second clips.
One night, while scrolling, I saw a video of fans running toward him at an airport.
They were screaming.
Crying.
Reaching out.
For a second, I felt something strange.
Jealousy?
Not because they touched him.
But because they had the chance to be there.
To exist in the same physical space.
I couldn't even imagine affording a passport, let alone a ticket.
That's when a tiny thought entered my head.
"This is stupid."
He doesn't know you.
He never will.
You're building feelings for pixels.
So I closed the app.
Put my phone face down.
Tried to focus on homework.
But ten minutes later…
I picked it up again.
"I don't even like him like that," I whispered.
And that was the first lie I told myself.
Not the last.
But definitely the first.