novelraw Chapter 21 Wrong Signals from Tiffany
Chapter 21 Wrong Signals from Tiffany
"Xiaoyan!"
Tiffany waved her iced Americano from afar, walked over briskly, and shoved one of the cups into his hand. "I bought this for you. Today is your first day on the job, so of course I had to come and support you."
Jiang Yan took the coffee; a fine layer of water droplets condensed on the cup, and the cool touch came from his palm.
Before he could thank her, Tiffany handed him the gift bag from her other hand. "And this too. Last night I saw a recommendation on social media for a must-have set for rookie trainees: knee pads, throat lozenges, and a pair of wired headphones recommended by my vocal coach. I use them to listen to demos on my phone during training, as wireless headphones have too high latency and aren't suitable for dance practice. It's nothing expensive, just a little something for Noona to say hello."
Jiang Yan took the bag and glanced down at the three items neatly arranged inside: light pink knee pads, a throat lozenge package with a bear wearing a scarf printed on it, and neatly coiled headphone wires.
He looked up, his lips moving slightly, "Nuna, this is too much of a waste, she..."
"Stop." Tiffany interrupted him, hands on her hips, adopting an uncompromising stance. "It's for my sister, not for you. You helped me get the title track sorted out, so it's only right that I give your sister some trainee stuff."
Looking at the bag in his hand, Jiang Yan couldn't help but feel uneasy.
Tiffany was too good to him.
They rescued him from that run-down recording studio in Yeonnam-dong, made connections for him, gave him pocket money, introduced him to clothes, treated him to high-end Japanese food, introduced him to Kim Tae-yeon, and now even prepared Kotaro's trainee supplies in advance.
This kind of goodness is almost abnormal.
He had met many kind-hearted seniors before, but Tiffany's kindness clearly went beyond the scope of ordinary seniors and juniors.
He sends messages to check on her every few days, and frequently gives her pocket money. Now he's even worried about his sister's affairs to this extent.
You can't blame him for being delusional.
He had seen similar scenes during his years in Busan.
The teaching assistant in the alley next to my hometown, who's doing her master's at Pukyong National University, also treated Lao Jiang's eldest apprentice the same way.
Today I'll give him some homemade cookies, tomorrow I'll tutor him in English, and the day after tomorrow I'll ask him to go see the fireworks in Guang'an.
Later, when her eldest apprentice got married, the bride wasn't her. That woman drank a whole bottle of liquor at the wedding and cried so much that half of her false eyelashes fell off.
Jiang Yan was only fourteen years old at the time, but that scene was etched in his mind, more memorable than any melodramatic TV series.
Thinking of this, he couldn't help but swallow, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down.
No way, it can't be.
Jiang Yan lowered his eyes, his gaze falling on Tiffany's shoulder and neck lines. The focus of those eyes wavered slightly for a moment as he released the senses he had been deliberately suppressing since entering the SM world.
The world exploded silently before his eyes.
Several layers of light surrounded Tiffany, but Jiang Yan ignored them and quickly scanned her chest.
The result was a huge relief to him; thankfully, it wasn't the kind of pink with a heart shape.
His tense shoulders visibly relaxed, and even the fingers gripping the gift bag loosened a bit.
To be honest, all he wants to do right now is make good music, make good money, and successfully train Kim Minjun to debut.
If this Nuna truly harbors feelings for him that go beyond friendship, it would be a complete burden for him at this moment.
It's not that Tiffany isn't good enough; quite the opposite, she's too good.
It was so good that he couldn't handle it and didn't know how to respond.
He was just a poor student who had just moved out of a semi-basement apartment. He was lucky to have a pair of eyes that could see through appearances, and he was lucky to help her. That was all.
Fortunately, this Nuna genuinely only admired and cared for him.
However, there's something else about Tiffany.
Jiang Yan's gaze shifted to the area directly above her chest, near her collarbone.
There floated a very faint yet extremely pure silver-white light, not dazzling, very soft, yet with an undeniable sense of resilience.
The layer of silvery-white mist was tilting slightly in his direction, with a stubborn and unyielding spirit.
He paused for a moment, then smiled bitterly to himself.
Sure enough, this Nuna was being so kind to him because she had ulterior motives.
He had seen a similar silvery-white light on Park Jung-ho before.
When Park Jung-ho met Ahn Jung-hwan that day, a silvery-white light emanated from his body, but Park Jung-ho's light was very faint and dissipated in a flash.
He hadn't fully figured out what the color represented, but over the past few days, he had a vague idea: it was a kind of entrustment, an expectation.
It is a deep-seated obsession that arises from the heart after placing high hopes on a certain goal, a certain thing, or a certain person.
Park Jung-ho's silver-white light was directed at his demo, because he hoped to use that demo to connect with SM Entertainment.
Tiffany's silvery-white light was directed at him.
Thinking back to that night under the cherry blossoms in Apgujeong, Jiang Yan roughly understood what was going on.
This woman seems to really care about Kim Tae-yeon's situation.
She placed her hopes on herself.
It wasn't what he mistakenly thought was affection, but rather a heavy entrustment, an almost obsessive expectation.
She believed he could help Kim Tae-yeon, just as he had helped her save her title track from being scrapped.
Jiang Yan lowered his eyes, brought the iced Americano to his lips and took a sip. The cold, bitter liquid slid down his throat, suppressing his thoughts.
He can only continue to play dumb about this matter for now.
The deep blue mist in Kim Tae-yeon's heart was too deep, too thick, and had been there for too long, and he had absolutely no way to resolve it.
Even if he had a way, Jiang Yan wouldn't be able to gain the trust of that woman who kept herself so tightly shut.
All he can do now is to do everything he has to do well, help Tiffany record the title track perfectly, help Kim Minjung gain a foothold in SM, and then slowly accumulate his own voice and qualifications.
One day, when he is no longer that poor student picked up from a small recording studio in Yeonnam-dong, and when he has enough influence in this industry, perhaps he can give it a try.
But definitely not now.
Jiang Yan withdrew his gaze, readjusting the focus of his eyes to normal. The swirling mist around Tiffany vanished instantly, and she transformed back into a beautiful woman in a white T-shirt and jeans, with a smile in her eyes.
"What's wrong? Why are you suddenly spacing out?" Tiffany tilted her head and looked at him, waving her hand in front of his face. "Are you so moved by Noona that you can't speak?"
"Yes." Jiang Yan looked up and smiled. "Thank you, Nuna. I will pass the things on to Minjung."
"That's more like it." Tiffany nodded in satisfaction, then pushed open the door to recording studio number one and called out, "Kenzie unnie! I brought Yeon!"
Jiang Yan followed Tiffany into the recording studio. Kenzie was sitting in front of the mixing console, wearing his signature Sennheiser HD 800 monitor headphones, his fingers repeatedly fine-tuning the volume of a string track on the faders.
Hearing the door open, she took off her headphones and turned around. When she saw Jiang Yan, a few fine lines appeared at the corners of her eyes. "You're here? Perfect timing."
She pulled a black-covered spiral notebook from the file shelf next to her, opened one of the pages, and found it densely covered with musical notes and annotations.
Kenzie pushed the notebook in front of Jiang Yan and pointed to one of the lines with her fingertip.
"This album is Red Velvet's second mini-album, 'The Velvet,' which was originally scheduled to be released on March 16. However, ten minutes before the release, during our final review of the album, we discovered something wrong with the audio and decided to postpone the release to the 17th."
She paused, picked up the listening earpiece on the table, and handed it to Jiang Yan. Her tone was as calm as if she were talking about something trivial, but her eyes were fixed on Jiang Yan's face, not missing a single subtle expression.
"This is the version before optimization. Listen to it and see if you can find any problems."
Kenzie leaned back in his chair, arms crossed, a faint smile playing on his lips.