Chapter Text
Encore of Ghosts
Hiatus had been a strange kind of heaven.
For the first time in years, we weren't being pulled in a hundred different directions at once. No rehearsals until dawn. No endless interviews where every word felt like a landmine. No bone-deep exhaustion chasing us into bed and dragging us back out again.
For the first time since Huntrix had taken off, we could just… be.
Rumi filled the space with noise. She dyed her hair three times in a month, bubblegum pink, then a near black that stained her pillowcases, then back to her natural violet like she was apologizing to her scalp and binge-watched every drama she could get her hands on. She turned our kitchen into a laboratory of instant-ramyeon recipes. She called them recipes, anyway. Sometimes they were genius, kimchi and cheese, spicy tuna with a perfectly timed egg. Sometimes they were disasters so bad Mira banned her from using the stove for a week. Rumi tried to argue that a blowtorch didn't count as the stove. It did.
Mira, meanwhile, discovered mornings. She moved like she'd been waiting her whole life for stillness. She collected plants until the penthouse looked like a greenhouse had thrown a party and never left. She brewed tea with delicate precision, read novels by the window where sunrise painted her hair gold, and started sketching quietly again, dress seams, stage silhouettes, little cartoons of us with absurdly big eyes that she hid when we walked by. She softened in ways I'd never seen, not in public, not even in practice. But in private, she laughed easier, leaned on me more, let herself be vulnerable in the quiet.
And me? I wrote. Lyrics spilled into notebooks, some half-finished, some complete, all mine. For the first time in forever, I wasn't writing for deadlines or Bobby's approval or to catch up with anyone else. I was writing because the sound in my head wouldn't stop humming until I let it out. The trash filled with pages I tore out not because they were bad, but because they were too much to leave lying around.
We built rituals that belonged to no one but us. Wednesdays became waffle nights because the waffle iron Rumi impulse-bought refused to be useful on any other day. Sundays, Mira made a pot of soup that tasted like a peace you didn't have to earn. I learned how to make coffee exactly the way each of them liked it, Rumi sweet enough to count as dessert, Mira precisely two and half teaspoons of sugar, no cream. They learned the sound I made when a lyric finally solved itself in my head and let me stop whatever I was doing to jot it down.
It was like we'd all been handed pieces of ourselves back, pieces we didn't know we'd lost until we felt them again.
And in that stillness, something else bloomed.
It started small. Mira leaning against me on the couch during one of Rumi's drama marathons, her shoulder warm against mine. Rumi's fingers brushing mine during a movie, lingering just a beat too long before pulling away. Rumi raiding my hoodie drawer and pretending not to notice when I never asked for them back. Mira falling asleep on my lap mid-afternoon, mouth parted, trusting me to hold the quiet steady.
Then came the night we all stayed up on the balcony. The city stretched beneath us, the sky bruised with dawn, and I cried, not from sadness, but from the weight of everything that had been lifted off me.
Rumi kissed me first. Quick, clumsy, tasting of soda and nerves. She pulled back laughing, cheeks flaming, already ready to cover it with a joke.
Before she could, Mira cupped my face in her hands and kissed me too, softer, steadier, lips carrying a kind of patience I didn't know I needed until that exact moment. There was nothing performative in it. No choreography. Just a yes we'd been circling so long we didn't recognize it until we were inside it.
The world didn't end. Nothing shattered. Instead, something settled into place.
We didn't talk about it, not really. We didn't need to. From then on, we just… were.
A throuple. In secret.
It was ours alone. Huntrix was too big, too visible. If anyone found out we weren't just bandmates but something more, the fallout could burn us alive. So, we tucked it away. In interviews, we laughed like sisters. Onstage, we moved like a single heartbeat. Behind closed doors, we curled around each other until the world felt far enough away.
Our secret. Our anchor. Our home.
It wasn't always easy. Secrets never are. There were mornings when Rumi brushed my waist in the kitchen and we both pretended it was an accident because Bobby had stopped by for an impromptu visit. Nights when Mira's hand found mine in the back of a car and we let go two blocks before we stopped because the driver could see. We learned how to talk in glances. How to say later with a knee pressed to a thigh and I'm here with a pinky hooked around a belt loop. The sacrifice felt worth it because we were choosing something bigger than a label. We were choosing us.
For a while, everything felt perfect.
But then the anxious hum started.
It began like a thread I couldn't find the end of, humming under my ribs. I laughed louder to drown it out. Danced harder. Kissed Rumi's temple longer, lingered in Mira's arms until sleep finally claimed me. But the hum stayed.
I told myself it was nothing. Just nerves. Just a body too used to running. But in my bones, I knew better. Something was coming.
The omens were minor and stupid, the kind you only notice because you're looking. A glass slipped out of my hand and shattered in the sink like a tiny, domestic omen. A lyric I'd been working on for days suddenly read like a warning. I woke at 2:11 three nights in a row and couldn't decide if it meant anything or if I was begging the universe to send me a sign so I could blame it later.
And then Bobby called a meeting.
He looked too excited when we walked in, pacing the conference room like he was holding the world in his hands. He's always been better at good news than bad. This was the best news ever in his head. That was the problem.
"You've outgrown Korea," he said without hesitation, not unkindly, just blunt the way men get when they've already made a decision and need you to applaud. "The world is watching. The next step is obvious, America. A full tour."
The word America hit me like a stone in the chest. I kept my face polite. I kept my breath even. I kept my hands where they could pass for relaxed.
"And," he went on, and I felt the and coming like a wave, "It only makes sense to start in Burbank."
My blood ran cold.
Burbank. My hometown. The place I swore I'd never go back to. The place I'd buried like a corpse under concrete.
Rumi gasped, practically bouncing in her chair. "Burbank?! Zo, that's your hometown! We'll get to see it, your places, your stories. This is perfect!"
Mira's lips curved in a soft, certain smile. "It'll be good to start there. Poetic, almost. Beginning our American tour where you began."
They both turned to me, eyes glowing with hope.
And all I could think about was hallways that reeked of bleach, locker doors slamming shut with me inside, laughter echoing while I bit my lip to keep from crying. I thought about the house I'd left behind, voices tearing at each other until the walls cracked, and a girl with heavy black eyeliner and a laugh I could still find in a dark room with my eyes closed.
I wanted to say no. To beg Bobby to choose anywhere else. To tell Rumi and Mira they didn't understand what it would cost me.
But the words stuck. Rumi's joy was too bright, Mira's calm too steady. If I refused, I'd ruin this for them. For Huntrix. For all of us.
"Think of the arc," Bobby said, already on slide eight of the deck I wasn't seeing. "Homecoming. The hometown star. The American press will eat it, feature spreads, interviews, the works. We'll control the story. We'll protect you," he added, like he remembered I was human. "Security will be tight. Plans on plans. We've got a U.S. partner who's excellent."
I nodded when I was supposed to. I heard words like control and protect and they sounded like umbrellas in a hurricane.
"Interviews?" Mira asked, voice even. Translation, how much narrative are you putting in Zoey's mouth and how do we keep her safe while she says it?
"Pre-screened," Bobby promised. "We'll rehearse your talking points. No surprises."
I smiled, too wide, and forced the word out. "Okay, I'm down. America. Burbank."
Inside, something cracked. Quietly. The way ice cracks under your feet on a pond you shouldn't be standing on.
That night, I couldn't sleep.
They could. Rumi and Mira were curled together in our bed, breaths synced. I had laid between them for hours but sleep wouldn't come. My body buzzed too hard for rest. I sat at the kitchen counter with a notebook open, scribbling words I'd never show anyone. Not even lyrics really. Just, words. Words too jagged, too raw, spilling across the page in frantic lines. If a place can keep the shape of your footsteps, why do mine still fit. If a house can keep the echo, why do I hear my name when no one's home.
The knock nearly sent the pen flying from my hand.
It wasn't a text, a call, a polite bzzz of the intercom. It was knuckles on wood. Midnight has a sound. This was it.
I opened the door before I could decide not to.
My mother stood there.
She'd always been beautiful, in that sharp way that makes you worry about touching it. Tonight her hair was pinned up like she'd tried to sleep and failed. Her makeup had been scrubbed off, but the anger left a color on her cheeks you don't get from blush.
"You can't go back there," she said.
"Mama…"
"You don't understand," she pressed, stepping inside before I could stop her. She didn't take off her shoes. She didn't look at the penthouse like it belonged to anyone but the overprotective argument she brought with her. "That place broke you once. You think it won't do it again?"
I clenched my hands into fists tighter. "That was a long time ago."
Her voice rose, slicing the quiet. "You cried yourself to sleep every night! You could barely eat, barely breathe. And now you want to walk back into that willingly?"
I glanced down the hall like it could absorb the volume. "Please," I said, softer, hands up without realizing. "Keep your voice down. They're sleeping."
She either didn't hear me or pretended she didn't. "You barely survived the first time! And now you want to put yourself on stage, in front of cameras, in front of them?" Her jaw trembled, but her voice didn't falter. "You'll be shattered all over again."
The words dug under my skin, clawing at things I hadn't let myself think about in years. Lockers. A gymnasium that smelled like rubber and cheap perfume. Names I refused to put back in my mouth. A prom dress that had been torn and me left stood up.
"Mama, please," I tried again, a hand half-raised like I could press the sound back into her throat. "Lower your voice."
"You rush into everything, Zoey!" she threw back, louder, like the plea itself offended her. "Always running headfirst without thinking. You think because you've been safe here, you'll be safe there? Mira and Rumi…"
"They're my bandmates and this tour means a lot to them." I snapped, too fast, too loud. "But even so, this isn't about them."
Her eyes burned. "It's always about them. They'll chase their dreams, and you'll pay the price. You'll let yourself be broken to keep Huntrix alive."
"That's not fair," I said, the heat stinging my eyes now because that's what tears do when you refuse them, they turn to steam. "Stop making this about them."
She took a breath like a diver, like she was going to go deeper and not come back up. "Your father…"
"No." A warning. It came out of me low and dangerous. "We're not doing that. Not here."
She laughed once, brittle. "We're already doing it, Zoey. We never stopped."
Footsteps shuffled behind me. The soft drag-sound of warm socks on wood.
"Zo?"
Rumi's voice, thick with sleep. Mira right beside her, every line of her gone still. Their hair was messy, eyes heavy, but the second they saw my face, my mother's fury, they were awake. Instantly.
"Zoey?" Mira's voice was low but alert, sharp enough to cut glass.
I turned quickly, forcing calm into my mouth that my chest couldn't find. "Sorry. I didn't mean to wake you. Go back to bed. It's fine."
But neither of them moved. They planted themselves at the archway, shoulders squared, a quiet, immovable, no, you don't have to do this alone.
Something in my mother's expression shifted, anger cooling into something clinical. She lowered her tone a fraction, not enough. "She should be resting, not planning tours. She's barely had time to recover, and you're going to work her to the bone."
Rumi bristled, fully awake now. "That's not fair. We'd never…"
"She's with us because she chooses to be," Mira cut in, voice steady and certain. The way you speak when you've already decided where you'll stand if the floor collapses.
My mother's gaze sliced across them. "She'll sacrifice herself for you, and you'll let her."
The words landed like knives. Because they weren't true, but they knew where to aim.
"Enough!" I snapped, stepping forward, fire shaking my voice. "Don't you dare put this on them. They're my family. They'd never hurt me and besides, this is my choice."
Her face flickered, pain flashing across it, but she held her ground. "Family doesn't let family walk back into a fire."
Mira's sharp intake cut through the silence. A breathe that I couldn't take.
"I am begging you, just drop it." I said again, one last time, even softer. Begging now. "Please."
Her eyes shone. It should have made her gentler. It made her precise. "Then I hope you're ready," she said, almost calm. "Because when what I fear happens again, I won't be able to be there to pick up the pieces."
And then she left.
The door shut behind her with a final snap. The kind that sounds like a lid on a box you're not meant to open again.
I reached after her, my hand catching nothing but air. But when my fingers curled on nothing, they balled into a fist instead.
Rumi and Mira turned to me, confusion and concern carved into their faces.
"Zo…" Rumi's voice cracked. "Why would she say that? Why doesn't she want you to go back?"
Mira's gaze was sharper, unblinking. "What aren't you telling us?"
A dozen answers swarmed my mouth and bit my tongue from the inside. Because the walls remember. Because that house taught me to listen for danger in just the way footsteps had echoes against the floor. Because they didn't know what I kept in a crack in the basement, or the way the record store guy knew to turn the music up when I walked in.
I forced myself to breathe, smoothing the crack in my voice. "It doesn't matter. None of it matters. We're going. End of story."
Rumi flinched at the heat in my tone, Mira only held my gaze, steady and unyielding. She never pushed when I was bleeding. She waited until I could hear her.
I softened, just enough to keep them close. "We've come too far to stop now. I won't let anything ruin this. Not for Huntrix. Not for us."
Silence swelled, then slowly let it go. Finally, Rumi stepped closer, resting her forehead against my shoulder, her fingers bunching in the fabric of my shirt like she could anchor me by holding on. Mira pressed in at my side, her arm brushing mine, the warmth of her a clear, quiet yes.
They didn't go back to bed. Didn't leave me to carry it alone. They just stayed, warm and steady, until my breath evened out and my hands remembered the shape of open.
We migrated to the couch because the kitchen still sounded like an argument. Mira tucked a blanket over our knees. Rumi stole my hoodie back from where she'd hidden it on the back of a chair and draped it over me like she was trying to make a fort out of cotton.
"Do you want tea?" Mira asked, already moving as if the question had only been spoken to be kind.
"I won't drink it," I admitted. "But I like the way it smells."
She nodded like that made perfect sense and set water to boil, measuring leaves like she was calibrating peace. Rumi pressed a cold bottle of water into my hand and watched me drink it like it was medicine. We didn't say anything important. We didn't have to. The air had been stuffed with too many words already. We let quiet do the heavy lifting.
When the kettle sang, Mira poured. Steam ribboned up. I held the mug like a small heater and let the mint clear the dust out of the back of my throat.
"Tomorrow," Rumi said eventually, tentative. "We can call Bobby and… I don't know. Ask if we can start somewhere else?"
"No," I said immediately. The speed surprised all three of us. "If I dodge it now, I'll spend the whole tour dodging. And you'll spend the whole tour watching me dodge. I don't want that."
Rumi's mouth pulled down. "I don't want you hurt."
"The truth is, even if I hate to admit it, is that I'm already hurt," I said, and the honesty startled me. "I'm just… choosing where to sit with it."
Mira's eyes softened, grief and pride in the same breath. "We're with you," she said. "On the stage. Off it. In the lobby of some hotel at two a.m. when you realize you hate the carpet. Wherever."
"Especially the carpet," Rumi said, because she can't not twist a line into a smile when she feels the room start to breathe again.
I smiled back, small, grateful. The clock on the stove clicked to 12:41 like it had been waiting for the right dramatic beat.
"Okay," I said finally. "Here's the deal. We do this. We go where they want us to go. We do the interviews. We stand on the stage. But between all that, I show you my places. The ones that don't hurt. The ones that do, but won't kill me. The record store with the owner who used to slip me burned CDs and pretend he didn't. The hill where you can see the ocean if you squint. The boardwalk… maybe," I added, because I am not a good liar to people who share my pillow and couldn't make all the promises right then. "We do it slowly. And if I say 'not this,' you believe me and we go another way."
Mira nodded, solemn as a vow. "Done."
Rumi squeezed my hand. "Done," she echoed, then leaned her head on my shoulder again like we'd just reset gravity.
We sat there until the tea went lukewarm. At some point, the hum in my chest got quieter, not gone, never gone, but willing to take a step back so I could sleep. They tugged me up between them and walked me to bed like I was made of something tender and expensive.
Rumi crawled in first and held out both arms like a ridiculous cartoon. "Get in here, American Girl," she said, and it should have annoyed me but it didn't. Mira climbed in on the other side and slid her hand under the hem of my shirt to press her palm flat over my stomach, a steadying weight that said here, breathe like this.
"It won't always make you hurt, will it?" Rumi asked into my shoulder. Not accusing. Not even quite a question. Just the truth reaching for a hand.
"No," I said, as if I could make it true by speaking. "Some of it will be fun. I do want you both to know me better. We'll be fine. We'll work. We'll eat bad airport food and make fun of managers and sleep too little and be brilliant onstage. We'll… we'll make it ours."
Mira's voice was a low thread. "We want to know you there. Not the version on stage only. The rest."
"I'll show you," I said. "Just… not all at once."
Rumi made a sound that was almost a laugh and almost a sob. "Okay," she said. "We'll take it however you give."
We breathed together our way back to almost-sleep, then to sleep. Before it took me, I made a promise I didn't let the room hear.
I would go back. I would stand where I learned to flinch and not flinch this time. I would peel up the boards and let whatever rats run out run. I would sing on top of the foundation that failed me and make it hold. For them. For the girl who kept the faucet running so no one would hear. For the woman who learned how to hold her own throat and let go.
Every song is an encore. Every city is a ghost.
Burbank would clap for me this time, or it would learn what it meant to be haunted.