Page 97 of Somewhere Only We Know
See you in a couple months!
JY
I smiled. It pained Ji-Yeon to allow me to eat so many carbs and wear less-skimpy costumes. In a shocking move, she had left the label with me to become my new manager. “Who else is going to make sure you do your ten-step skin-care routine?” she had said with a sniff.
We were now with a smaller company based in LA. They repped a few K-pop bands but mostly independent artists. Like me. It was scary, but after a few months back in LA, I was finally falling into a routine and working on a new album again. It was still K-pop, but I was working closely with the songwriters, and I would be releasing it as Cat. Short for my full name, Catherine Nam.
The best part? My home base was LA with occasional long trips to Korea. And my schedule was so blessedly manageable—recording a few days a week, dinners with my family. And therapy. Regularly. Moving back home had eased a lot of my anxiety, but I still needed help,and my parents insisted on regular appointments with a therapist. So far, I liked her, though it was hard to shake off the feeling of shame at first. Cultural stigmas die hard.
I closed out of my email and glanced at the time on my homescreen. It was almost six. Time to roll.
A half-hour later, my sister dropped me off in front of a bar in Hollywood. I still couldn’t believe the state allowed her to get behind the wheel of a dangerous killing machine.
“Take the freeway back home, don’t get creative and go on Mulholland or something,” I said to her firmly as I unbuckled my seat belt.
Vivian made a fart noise. “Not that I need your permission, but I’mfinewith driving on Mulholland.”
“If you want todiedriving off a cliff!” I said with my body twisted around reaching for my guitar case in the back seat.
“Whywould I randomlydrive offa cliff?!” she screeched.
The guitar almost hit her in the head. “Oops, sorry. I don’t know, even good drivers can—”
“Oh my God, I’m so excited for this Lilith Fair phase of your life to be over!” Vivian unlocked the doors with an aggressive jab on the button.
“Maybe I’ll do thisforeverto torture you,” I said, pulling on my black, wide-brimmed hat.
“Go play your stupid music!”
The car left with a roar, leaving me in the wake of its exhaust. Nice. It actually made me happy to be treated like garbage by my sister again.
Hollywood was already in full swing on this warm Friday evening. Bros in dress shirts with a sheen, girls in short skirts and high heels, tourists gawking at everyone, parking dudes peddling their thirty-dollar lots, homeless people navigating around all of it deftly, aKorean-Brazilian food truck with customers lined up along the curb, hipsters walking briskly like they had somewhere to go…
It was both gross and great—the dichotomy of Hollywood. City of dreams.
I entered the bar through the back door and someone was already onstage, playing with a four-piece band. Something jazzy. The place wasn’t too full yet; it was still early for the weekend.
After grabbing a soda water from the bar, I found a seat in the very back, a dark corner lit by a single candle.
“Excuse me.”
I glanced over at a young woman who was standing in front of me, clutching a purse to her chest. “Yes?”
“Are you… Lucky?” She whispered the last part.
“Yes,” I whispered back. “But can we keep that between us? I don’t want everyone to know I’m here yet.”
She nodded vigorously. “Oh my gosh, of course!”
I was playing in small venues across LA as an experiment. It wasn’t as Lucky or even Cat. It was only me, Catherine Nam, a guitar, and my own songs.
I had tried to keep my identity a secret at first, but my cover was blown almost immediately. Even without the pink hair, people recognized me in America now. It had frustrated me at first, but I had turned it into yet another way to connect with fans. I decided to make the appearances an exclusive show for Lucky fans—only giving out twenty tickets per “secret show.” It was a lottery and people were informed of the location day-of. They even had to leave their phones and cameras at the door.
The first time I had gone onstage here, last month, I was terrified.It seemed cliché, the K-pop star who performed in front of sixty thousand–seat stadiums being nervous about being solo on a small stage.
Playing my own music required a level of vulnerability that was brand-new to me. I had felt naked.
But I also felt the same energy from my old shows as Lucky. Like I did that last night in Hong Kong. The adoration and love had poured through. I felt it in the air as keenly as I did one year ago.
