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Speaking with Becka had helped put things into perspective. Hana had invented a story around me that I had never consented to be in. She had harassed Joon, blackmailed him, broken us up and had now travelled internationally to try and frame me as his secret girlfriend by shoving me in front of an aggressive paparazzo in a locked car.

“Yeah,” I mumbled to myself as I packed my suitcase. “Let her rot.”

We arrived back in Seoul in the middle of September. The tour was on its final production reset period. The set pieces that were being used for the final shows were now being moved to Busan for set up, while the spares had been shipped to Seoul to be broken down or stored. I didn’t try to pretend like the thought didn’t make me a little sad. They were just set pieces. They’d done their job, and they’d come out again in the future for another artist. Another tour.

“Are you crying over the set pieces again?” Jackson asked, nudging me in the shoulder as we watched storage containers be driven into the cavernous warehouse at ENT on forklift trucks.

“Fuck off,” I mumbled, wiping my face on my shoulder. “It’s the wind. It got in my eyes.”

Jackson laughed. “Aww, don’t worry Thompson. All those little bulbs got to live their best lives before they burnt out. The wiring? It’ll go on to wire another day. And the flooring? It’ll have many more dance routines performed on it.”

I laughed, acknowledging how ridiculous it was to be nostalgic over frames and lighting.

“I get it,” he said, sobering up. “It is a little sad to see something so big be broken down and stored away. But we got to enjoy it. It did its job and that’s all any of us can ask for, eh?”

“Don’t you start getting nostalgic,” I sighed, turning away as the loading bay doors were finally closed with a resounding clang.

Jackson shoved his hands in his pockets and followed me as we walked back up the slope to the street.

“I’m leaving in a couple of days,” he said casually.

I turned to face him, almost tripping on a stone. “Are you? You’re not coming to Busan for the last shows?”

“Nope. Contract didn’t cover the encores.”

I was quiet for a moment as I thought about this newest reminder of things coming to an end. “So. What’s next?”

“I’m going home for a bit. I miss my family. I miss my cat,” he laughed.

“And then?”

Jackson rubbed the back of his neck, looking off into the distance. “I dunno. Maybe I’ll stay home for a bit. Do some theatre productions in Edinburgh, or London.”

“No more world tours?”

“Don’t get me wrong,” he said quickly, turning to look at me as though I might take it personally if he wasn’t jumping at the chance for another global tour. “I like touring, and a production of this size… mate, it was the dream. But it’s a lot, you know? It feels like you stand still when you do stuff like this. Your entire life is absorbed into months and months of travel and set up, and then when it ends, what are you supposed to do? I can’t explain it, Thompson. I’ve done a few of these now, and every time I come out at the end not knowing what to do with myself for ages afterwards.”

He blew out a breath as we paused on the street outside ENT, watching the traffic flow past.

“I think I wanna stay home for a bit,” he concluded, shoving his hands in his pockets.

I nodded, and we were quiet for a few moments, letting the noise of the street fill the gaps.

“I’ll miss you in Busan,” I said conversationally.

Jackson looked at me sideways. “Yeah? If you start feeling sentimental, Thompson, just have a look at the set pieces and let yourself have a wee cry.”

“Oh, shut up,” I laughed.

GVibes were staying in Seoul to film segments for the docuseries that was going to be released at the end of the tour, so most of the media crew was locked in. I wasn’t needed for this specific requirement, so I spent much of my time finishing up my final pieces and handing them off to my editor.

I also had to spend a couple of days speaking with the legal team at ENT. While they had everything from Monsieur Lallouche, and the French prosecutors, they wanted to know what had possessed Hana to travel all the way to France, knowingly breaching her protection order, just to get to me. They already knew that before she was fired from ENT, she’d had access to the tour itinerary, from airport dates and locations, to the individual member commitments, like Paris Fashion Week, so she’d known she would be breaching the order by being at Charles de Gaulle that day.

We had briefly discussed what I believed she thought she knew about me and Jihoon, but ultimately, it didn’t matter what motive she thought she had. What mattered was that she had breached the order.

In a way, that black and white approach was a comfort. I just didn’t think the rest of the world would necessarily agree.

I barely saw Jihoon the entire time we were in Seoul, which felt somehow contradictory, considering, but so much had been scheduled in these next few weeks before the final concerts. The group were not only filming for the docuseries, but also attending a music awards show and a large charity event for an organisation they had helped set up after the pandemic.