Chapter 10: The Untitled Melody
The nameless composition stayed between the two of them for an entire week.
It was saved on Yoo-jin’s computer under a temporary code, appeared on Ji-hoon’s phone as “Rain Version,” then vanished from every meeting whenever people from Aurora asked about the official lead-track list.
“This song needs a title,” the production director said in a meeting.
Yoo-jin turned a page.
“Not yet.”
“How are we supposed to put an untitled song in the paperwork?”
“Use the temporary code.”
“Do you think the agency has time to wait for your inspiration?”
Ji-hoon sat at the end of the table without saying a word.
The album release plan filled the large screen. Ten songs, three proposed lead tracks, the video shoot schedule, the promotional schedule, the list of television programs. Everything had been divided into neat little squares.
Only their composition was nowhere to be found.
“This song isn’t commercial enough,” the director said. “It needs a more memorable title, a clearer chorus, and a bigger climax.”
“No,” Ji-hoon said.
Everyone turned toward him.
“No?”
“It doesn’t need a bigger climax.”
“Ji-hoon, you don’t understand the release strategy.”
“I understand the song.”
“The song doesn’t have a title.”
“But it has a voice.”
The room fell silent.
Yoo-jin looked at him but didn’t intervene.
Ji-hoon continued:
“This composition doesn’t need to overwhelm the listener. It only needs to make them stop.”
“Stop for what?”
“To listen.”
The production director laughed.
“Listeners aren’t that patient.”
“Then we’ll write for the ones who still are.”
Only after he said it did Ji-hoon realize how much his answer sounded like Yoo-jin.
The meeting ended without a decision.
The composition still had no title.
That afternoon, Ji-hoon had to film an album promo video. The director asked him to stand in front of a white backdrop, hold a stack of lyrics, and talk about “a fresh new musical color.”
“This album will show a more mature Ji-hoon.”
He read the line.
“The music will convey sincerity and hope.”
The director nodded.
“Good. Again, this time with a bigger smile.”
Ji-hoon smiled.
But all he could think about was the untitled composition, the sound of rain woven between the piano notes, and the empty space at the end of the lyric line.
That night, he arrived at Studio C more than an hour late.
Yoo-jin didn’t blame him. He simply set a still-warm boxed meal in front of him.
“When did you buy this?”
“Before you got here.”
“You knew I’d come?”
“You said you’d come every day.”
Ji-hoon sat down.
“You believed me?”
“I heard you say it.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“For me, it is.”
Ji-hoon opened the box. The smell of hot food spread through the chilly room.
“Have you eaten?”
“Yes.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
“What did you eat?”
Yoo-jin’s hand paused.
“I don’t remember.”
Ji-hoon looked at him.
“You’re not good at lying.”
“I haven’t eaten.”
“Then eat with me.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Neither am I.”
“But you’re still eating.”
“Because you bought it.”
Yoo-jin looked at him for a few seconds, then pulled over the chair beside him.
The two of them shared one boxed meal in the small room. There was no music, no camera, no one asking how many copies the album would sell.
Ji-hoon picked up a piece of meat and put it in Yoo-jin’s box.
“Eat.”
“I can pick it up myself.”
“I know.”
“Then why?”
“Because I wanted to.”
Yoo-jin looked at the piece of meat, then ate it.
It was something very small. But Ji-hoon suddenly felt that it resembled a kind of intimate exchange he had never been used to.
After dinner, Yoo-jin opened the composition.
“I revised the ending.”
“Let me hear it.”
The melody rang out. The ending was no longer left completely open. A thin string of sound joined the piano, like the first light appearing beneath a door before dawn.
Ji-hoon listened to the end.
“Why did you add that?”
“Because you managed to sing the word ‘stay.’”
“That’s unrelated.”
“It is.”
“Does the composition need someone to stay?”
“It does.”
“Then has that person opened the door yet?”
Yoo-jin didn’t answer.
Ji-hoon turned toward him.
“Do you always leave people standing outside the door?”
“Not everyone wants to come in.”
“Have you asked?”
“Not yet.”
“Then how do you know?”
Yoo-jin looked at the screen, but this time he didn’t avoid Ji-hoon’s eyes.
“Because I asked once.”
“And that person refused?”
“No.”
“Then what happened?”
“I wasn’t brave enough to open the door.”
Ji-hoon didn’t know whether that story had anything to do with the person who had sung on the old demo. He didn’t know whether he had the right to keep asking.
Yoo-jin took a blank sheet of paper.
“Name it.”
“The song?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re not naming it yourself?”
“I want to hear it from you.”
Ji-hoon picked up a pen and wrote down a few names.
“The One Who Can’t Sleep.”
“Already used.”
“The Empty Space.”
“Too generic.”
“Rain Version.”
“Too direct.”
“You’re really picky.”
“You haven’t picked the right one.”
Ji-hoon propped his chin on his hand and thought.
Outside the door, the city lit up with distant windows. The moon was half-covered by clouds, leaving only a thin silver streak across the sky.
He looked at it through the glass.
“The Moonlight That Never Fades.”
Yoo-jin looked up.
“What?”
“The song’s title.”
“Why?”
“Because there are nights when we can’t see it, but it’s still there.”
Yoo-jin looked out the window.
“That sounds like a promise.”
“It’s not.”
“Then what is it?”
“It’s a fact.”
The two of them looked at the streak of moonlight in the sky.
“Okay,” Yoo-jin said.
“You agree?”
“Yeah.”
“That easily?”
“Because I like it.”
Ji-hoon turned toward him.
“You like the song title, or the person who came up with it?”
The question came out more naturally than it should have.
Yoo-jin looked at him.
Neither of them smiled.
The silence stretched on. Ji-hoon could clearly hear the air conditioner, the computer running, and his own heart beating in his chest.
Yoo-jin was the first to look away.
“Let’s record.”
Ji-hoon stepped into the recording booth.
The lyrics had been revised. The final line was no longer a plea. It had become a calm statement:
“If you can’t see it tonight, the moonlight has never once faded.”
Ji-hoon read it over and over.
“Did you write this line?”
“Yeah.”
“Who did you write it for?”
Yoo-jin didn’t answer.
Ji-hoon put on his headphones.
This time, he sang without needing Yoo-jin’s direction. His voice moved through the low notes, touched the silence, then gradually opened up in the chorus. It wasn’t an explosion. It was simply someone who had stood in the dark for too long finally allowing himself to look toward the light.
At the final line, Ji-hoon didn’t break softly.
He sang it clearly.
The recording ended.
Yoo-jin didn’t hit stop right away. He let several seconds of silence after the final sustained note remain in the recording.
“Use this take,” Ji-hoon said.
“Yeah.”
“Don’t record it again.”
“Yeah.”
“Will you protect it?”
Yoo-jin looked at him through the glass.
“I’ll try.”
“I don’t need you to try.”
“Then what do you need?”
Ji-hoon placed a hand on the microphone.
“Don’t let them take it without asking me.”
“I won’t.”
“Even if they want to replace you?”
“I won’t let them take it without asking you.”
Yoo-jin repeated the exact same words, calm and certain.
Ji-hoon knew Yoo-jin couldn’t control everything. He knew a promise in a recording studio couldn’t stand against an entire agency. But for the first time, he didn’t need reassurance that everything would be safe.
He only needed someone standing beside him when things began to be unsafe.
It was well past midnight when Ji-hoon left.
Yoo-jin walked him to the door, still holding the black umbrella. It wasn’t raining, but he hadn’t left it in the recording studio.
“Are you coming tomorrow?”
“Yes.”
“To record the new song?”
“Yes.”
“For work?”
Ji-hoon looked at him.
“Because the song has a title now.”
“That’s all?”
“And because of the person who wrote it.”
Yoo-jin stood beneath the hallway light without saying a word.
Ji-hoon turned away first, but the corners of his mouth had already curved upward.
Back in Studio C, Yoo-jin returned to the mixing desk. He opened the album file and filled in the song title on the last blank line:
“The Moonlight That Never Fades.”
The cursor blinked beside Ji-hoon’s name.
Below it, in the producer’s notes, he wrote a short sentence:
“The first recording where the singer didn’t apologize for being heard.”
At the same time, on the first floor of Aurora, Min-woo received a report about the new song.
The title made him pause.
He opened the audio file.
Ji-hoon’s voice rang through the night, gentle and distant, as if he were singing for one person alone.
Min-woo turned off the music before the song ended.
Then he called someone in the production department.
“That composition is not going on the release list.”
The person on the other end hesitated.
“But Ji-hoon has already recorded it.”
“Then delete the recording.”
“Producer Yoo-jin won’t agree.”
Min-woo looked at the lights reflected in the glass door.
“He doesn’t need to agree.”
In Studio C, Yoo-jin still didn’t know that their composition had just become the first target.
And on his way home, Ji-hoon was listening to the chorus over and over.
For the first time in his life, he had a song written not for his public image, not for the agency, not for the audience.
A song with a title.
A writer.
And someone who was beginning to fear that if it were taken away, he wouldn’t just lose the music.