“Hyun-soo, did you print out all the viewers’ stories?”
In the office next to the bustling corridor of the broadcasting station, where people’s footsteps alternated between leisure and haste, Jeong-eun asked Hyun-soo, who was seated next to her and clicking away at the mouse, whether he had completed the task she had entrusted to him.
I wondered what he was looking at so intensely on his monitor, half-expecting that Jeong-eun might get sucked into the screen even before Hyun-soo could answer.
“Ah, that. I asked Mi-jung to take care of it. Oh, right, right. The interns aren’t here this afternoon. I’ll go get it right now, just a moment.”
As if having sensors triggered by Jeong-eun’s stern tone, Hyun-soo stopped typing and briskly stood up from his seat, walking somewhere with determination.
His face, set to fill in for the absent interns with his own diligence, showed no trace of complaint. Our lovely youngest writer.
“I-ha-ru, stop looking over there and come here.”
My head, which was following Hyun-soo’s departing steps, snapped in the opposite direction at Jeong-eun’s sharp command.
What’s the matter? Without lifting my buttocks from the rolling chair, I pushed myself across the floor to Jeong-eun’s desk.
Jeong-eun, upon my arrival, suddenly craned her neck like a kangaroo and started looking around. It was a gesture of wariness, checking if any prying eyes were directed our way.
I looked around, too, clueless. Several desks had been empty since an hour ago, and unless their occupants suddenly burst in, there seemed to be no one of concern at the moment.
“You’re lucky I checked first.”
Jeong-eun’s words filled the air with unnecessary apprehension. What had she checked, and why would it involve me?
Before I could find out, a sense of worry weighed down my eyebrows.
Jeong-eun, seemingly oblivious to my anxiety, took another quick glance around and then displayed a photo on the monitor. The moment I saw that photo, my heart sank.
“This, this is… how…”
The monitor showed a photo from last evening at the broadcasting station’s first floor, where Jun and I had met. More precisely, it captured the moment when Jun was holding my hat’s brim and staring intently at my face. That moment sprawled across the monitor like a scene from a painting.
I couldn’t string together my next words. Alternating my gaze between the photo and Jeong-eun, my dismayed expression must have been quite a sight for her. Jeong-eun sighed softly and said,
“I-ha-ru, you might not know this, but Kim Jun is quite famous in Korea. Not just famous, he even has a fan club. Honestly, he’s too handsome to be a film director. People joke that if he had become an actor instead, he would have been famous much earlier.”
As Jeong-eun spoke, my eyes traced over Jun’s face in the photo, which looked at mine hidden under the hat, like a scene from a movie.
“It seems that a fan of Kim Jun who happened to be there at that time took the photo secretly. Given that it’s a side profile and you’re wearing a hat, even fans might be uncertain whether it’s really Kim Jun from this photo alone.”
Listening to Jeong-eun, I felt my mouth go dry.
“We announced that we’re making a movie about Kim Jun’s first love, remember? That must be why. Someone posted a photo on the viewer’s forum asking if Kim Jun was really here that day, saying the person in the photo looked like Kim Jun. They said they posted it for confirmation, but it was caught by me.”
Jeong-eun’s remarks made me realize anew that Jun was a public figure. The fact that Jun’s and my moments could be captured by someone else’s camera was more disconcerting than I had thought.
I wondered if Jun always felt eyes on him, even while just walking down the street or going to a restaurant. The regret that I should have been more careful on my part also surfaced.
“I’ve blocked the post as inappropriate content, and told them that Director Kim Jun just returned to Korea yesterday and I’m unaware of his personal schedule. But I know. You ran out to meet Kim Jun at this exact time that day.”
Jeong-eun’s timing to stop talking seemed a bit peculiar. It almost sounded like an accusation that I’d rushed out to have a secret meeting with Jun.
“Seo Jeong-eun, I know what you want to hear, but it’s not true. That day, Jun was worried about being recognized, so he had prepared a hat for me in advance. That’s probably when it was taken.”
Jeong-eun seemed to relax her gaze as if she hadn’t really been worried.
“Well, I sort of expected that answer. Kim Jun has a girlfriend anyway. Even if he was your first love, it would be strange if he suddenly broke up with his girlfriend to meet you.”
Just hearing about Jun’s girlfriend made my chest sting as if I’d swallowed small needles.
“Even if it was that, I wouldn’t accept it. I’d have dragged you away if he’d just switched girlfriends like changing files. If that was the case, I would have scolded you.”
“Seo Writer, here are the printed viewer stories.”
Hyun-soo approached us with a thick bundle of documents.
My Step-brother Is Obsessed With Me (Female-dominant)
A gentle female protagonist vs pitiful in the early stage, and a sick male protagonist in the later stage
Cheng Songer transmigrated into the body of a vicious cannon fodder female supporting character with the same name as her in a female-dominant novel.
In the original story, the cannon fodder female supporting character was inhumane, committing domestic violence, gambling excessively, being lustful, and even wanting to sell her stepbrother to a brothel for money.
As luck would have it, she just happened to transmigrate at this time.
Seeing Cheng Qingzhi biting his lip, enduring the tears in his eyes, looking pitiful, her heart softened.
She stuffed the money back into the Madam’s hand and reached out to him.
“Brother, come home with me.”
