1. What is your dream, Uncle?
“Un-tie!”
“Un-cle!”
I have two capable older brothers who run a business with my parents, and they have children—my nephews.
And my nephews absolutely love playing with me.
Every time they come to our house, they run straight to me without fail.
“Ohohoho… the kids like their uncle so much!”
“Exactly. I think you play with them better than we do!”
Thanks to this, my sisters-in-law loved coming over because they could finally get some rest.
Even though visiting the in-laws can be uncomfortable, it seemed the comfort of dropping off the kids to rest was simply too good to pass up.
My brothers, who graduated from prestigious universities, met similar women and married early, having children at a young age. My eldest sister-in-law is a lawyer, and the second is an accountant. Since they are so busy, I—who was always home—naturally ended up watching the kids. Eventually, even my parents stood by and said, “If you’re going to just play around at home, at least look after the kids.”
So, one by one, my brothers moved back into our house…
And suddenly, I was reborn as the primary caregiver for my nephews.
The result was the discovery of my true talent.
That’s right, my real talent was…
‘Parenting.’
“Hey! Hey! Watch the neck!”
“You wanna die? Ow, that hurts!”
“How dare you talk to your hyung like that. You wanna die? For real?”
While I sat in the living room folding the boys’ underwear, my nephews were wrestling. It was absolute chaos.
Well, it makes sense: four sons from my oldest brother, and four from the second.
They say one child is a torture for some, so with eight boys gathered together, there was no need for words.
‘The people in my family are true patriots, I swear.’ (Note: Refers to having many children for the country’s population)
By the time I finished folding the underwear and put them in the basket, their wrestling had turned into a full-blown fight.
I gathered strength from my core and shouted.
“Stop!”
Freeze.
The little ones, who had been fiercely hitting each other, stopped in their tracks at my command.
“Song Se-bin. Song Da-bin. Why are you fighting when you were playing so well?”
“But Uncle, he started it…”
“Uncle! Hyung did it first!”
Se-bin and Da-bin both started talking at once, looking wronged.
I held up my hand to stop them and pointed to different rooms.
“Se-bin, go to this room. Da-bin, go to that room. I’ll listen to your stories separately.”
“Che…”
The two elementary schoolers glared at each other and went into their respective rooms.
Rule number one of stopping a sibling fight:
Separate them first!
Listening to them together only makes the fight worse.
It’s better to separate them and listen one-on-one.
If you listen, empathize, tell them what was wrong, and soothe them, there’s a high chance the situation will end peacefully.
Except for the 5-year-old youngest, seven of the nephews were between the ages of 9 and 15.
Fighting was just daily life, and by now, I was a master at stopping kids’ fights.
Actually, kids are people too—if you listen to what they want to say, they usually calm down.
It’s just that most adults don’t listen.
My nephews had reached the point where they ran to me instead of their moms when something happened.
I could tell just by how they cried out for “Uncle!” instead of “Mom!” when they were upset.
“Do you feel better now?”
Da-bin had poured out his tears and whined to me for a long time about how unfair it was.
After listening and comforting him, he nodded as if his anger had subsided.
“Then are you going to play with Se-bin hyung again?”
“Yeah!”
“Okay, then go play. No fighting this time, okay?”
With eyes still watery, Da-bin ran back to the living room with a bright smile.
He went back to playing with Se-bin, whom I had comforted earlier, as if nothing had happened.
Anyway, after soothing Se-bin and Da-bin.
While the nephews played until bedtime, I finished organizing their laundry in the closet.
Once the kids finished brushing their teeth and put on their pajamas, I called for a roll call in the living room.
“Roll call!”
“…One.”
“Two.”
“Three.”
“Four!”
“Five!”
“Six!”
“Seven!”
“Eigh! Number end!”
After the roll call ended with the youngest, 5-year-old Yeo-bin, I pointed to the rooms.
“If you’re done brushing, go to sleep. Growth hormones start pumping from 10 PM!”
“Pumping!”
“Ugh, so childish…”
The excited younger kids, the older ones who were starting to find it childish, and even the middle schooler who shook his head in disgust as he walked into the room.
I chuckled, carried the youngest to his room, and tucked him in. Once he drifted off to sleep, I quietly turned off the light and slipped out.
“Tomorrow, I’ll be thirty…”
December 31st.
The last day of the year.
My parents and brothers’ couples said they would be very late because of year-end parties with clients.
So today, feeding and putting the kids to bed was my job again.
“Now I’m off the clock!”
The living room was quiet, with everyone seemingly asleep.
I pulled a beer out of the fridge for the first time in a while, sat on the sofa, and turned on the TV.
Maybe because it was the end of the year, every channel was broadcasting award shows.
Drama awards here, entertainment awards there. And somewhere else, the music awards.
I mindlessly fixed the channel on the music awards show.
On the screen, singers were performing special stages.
But then.
As I was swallowing a gulp of beer, I almost spat it out when I saw a face on the screen.
“Cough! Wh-what?”
On the TV, dancing with an overwhelming presence among the idol members, was a man.
Amazingly, it was a face I knew.
No, not just someone I knew…
He was a former member of the group I debuted with, the main dancer, Han Ji-hyuk.
‘Hexad Carmit,’ which could be called my prime.
One of the members I shed blood and sweat with at Willow Entertainment.
I stared blankly as he received an award as an active singer.
This strange scene didn’t stop there.
The person named as the Grand Prize (Daesang) winner was also a face I knew.
It was Hong Ui-rim, who had been our group’s main vocal.
“I want to give my deep thanks to the fans who have always stayed by my side…”
The dream I had given up on a long time ago.
The other members were still following it until the end…
I started searching the names of the other members on the internet, one by one.
And I was shocked.
Ga Du-in, the rapper who could compose and produce.
He was now the head of a giant label with many famous rappers.
Cha Un, the visual member who was making a name for himself in acting.
He was active as the star actor for an agency founded by our former manager.
Kang Su-woo, who had great variety skills.
When I searched him, five regular programs appeared under his name.
All the members were still very active.
Suddenly, reality hit me hard.
Even if I searched my name, I would only see a single line about my past as an idol among countless people with the same name…
Except for me, all the other members were standing on stage in the spotlight.
“Yeah, they were members with amazing talent from the start…”
Because they were that talented, they were noticed as legendary rookies when we first debuted.
“I was pretty good back then, too…”
Suddenly, a sense of regret for my current situation washed over me.
The beer I drank like a machine had no taste.
Now, I was living in a completely different world.
Just stopping my nephews’ fights and putting them to sleep.
‘Haha…’
A hollow laugh came out.
Looking back, the reasons we fought were all just childish and trivial.
If only the company had taken a little care of those childish fights… it wouldn’t have gone that far.
‘No, if I could go back to that time now.’
I would have taken good care of the members.
I could have listened to them like I do for my nephews, comforted them, and made sure we didn’t fight—we could have stayed together for a long time.
“…What’s the point of regretting it now. It’s not like I can turn back time.”
A member’s brightly smiling face filled the screen.
I finished the rest of my beer and turned off the TV.
My mouth tasted bitter.
The crumpled mood wouldn’t go away.
I went into the room where the youngest was sleeping, turned on a lamp, and opened my diary.
Writing in a diary before bed had been a habit since I was young.
Even during the first month after debut, when I couldn’t even sleep three hours a day, I always kept my diary with me.
I spent a long time writing down today’s events,
Then, my hand suddenly stopped.
Diaries have a strange feature: sometimes when you write, you discover your true feelings that even you didn’t know.
I tried to write as if it were nothing.
“…….”
I felt so wronged.
I felt so much regret.
I was so angry.
We clearly started as the same group.
But now, there was an insurmountable wall between them and me.
Feeling emotional, I pulled out my old diaries from the drawer.
When I was picked as a ‘Willow-i’ trainee at Willow Entertainment,
When I moved to Seoul at the young age of 14 to receive training,
When I was picked for the debut lineup through a survival show and debuted as the idol Hexad Carmit.
And…
When the recording of the fight between members in the waiting room was leaked, and the group disbanded…
All those moments were captured exactly in the diaries.
From starting life as a trainee at 14 to debuting at 18.
The most brilliant yet regretful moments of my life, as I was about to turn 30.
My nephew Han-bin had asked me once.
‘Uncle, what is your dream?’
Since the kids didn’t know I had once debuted as an idol, I just dodged the question back then.
But my dream was always the same.
I want to start over.
I want to appear on that TV too, standing proudly among the members receiving the spotlight…
I collapsed, burying my face in the open diary.
The fatigue accumulated from a whole day of parenting hit me all at once.
‘Maybe I’ll sleep for a bit…’
Just then, a single tear fell from my eye and dropped onto the diary…
And my consciousness slowly fell into the darkness.
