“Ah. Did I wake you up?”
Sehyun’s way of speaking was somehow slurred and mumbled.
What’s this, did he drink? It seemed like there was a smell of alcohol from somewhere.
Sniff sniff, sniff sniff. Doha sniffed.
“Did you drink?”
“Mm, well, there was something like that.”
“What was it?”
“Something to celebrate?”
“……”
Lim Sehyun barges into other people’s worlds carelessly and pushes his way in, yet he tries to hide his own world so no one knows.
That point was quite despicable.
Doha sneaked another glance at the laptop screen.
In the dark room, that wide apricot-colored feast filling the screen. And the reaction of Sehyun, who sensed Doha’s gaze and hurriedly slammed the laptop shut. All the circumstantial evidence was perfect. Of course.
“You were watching porn.”
“……Your imagination is really something.”
Sehyun looked at Doha with an expression of disbelief and shock.
At the intense reaction, Doha smiled with satisfaction. Usually pretending to be a saint, pretending to be an ascetic idol, spouting all kinds of nagging.
Triumphant, Doha pressed Sehyun as if he had caught a weakness.
“How can you, huh? With your roommate right here, next to you, doing such, huh? Such blasphemous acts, huh?”
“I said it’s not that.”
“What do you mean it’s not. The speed at which you closed the laptop was practically the speed of light. If you have nothing to feel guilty about, why hide it?”
Sehyun’s mouth moved as if feeling wronged, but Doha didn’t give him an opening.
“Alright, I understand. You’re a man too. At an age when your blood is boiling, always chewing on chicken breast, you could get sexually frustrated. And on top of that, you drank……”
Doha smiled pretending to be a generous hyung.
“……Ha.”
Sehyun let out a hollow laugh as if dumbfounded. He dry-washed his face and stared intently at Doha.
“Hyung must watch that kind of thing often.”
“What?”
Why the sudden counterattack?
“That’s why you naturally think in that direction.”
Look at this bastard?
Doha was dumbfounded instead. Did he get caught in a trap?
“But you know what.”
Sehyun’s eyes gleamed as he sat down on his bed. The atmosphere became even more thick.
“I’m curious about something.”
“What.”
“When hyung watches those videos, what kind does he watch?”
“Huh?”
Flustered, Doha’s eyes widened. Do people normally ask each other this kind of thing? Well, come to think of it, during school days they did ask each other things like whether your preference was Western or Asian. But that was really immature adolescent stuff.
“Why are you asking that? What, if you know my preference you’ll find it for me?”
“No, I’m just curious. Whether hyung watches ones with women in them, or ones with only men.”
Ah, so that’s what he meant. How annoying. Really.
Even though he wasn’t really Baek Doha, he was irritated by Sehyun’s words. No, he was even more irritated because he wasn’t the real one. I don’t want to be misunderstood like that!
“I’m suddenly curious. How do men do it with each other.”
“Don’t ask me.”
“What’s there to be reserved about between us. Let me learn a bit too.”
Does this bastard really have udon noodles in his brain?
“Why do you need to know that?”
When Doha reacted indignantly, Sehyun rubbed his chin with his hand.
“Who knows. You never know what might happen in life going forward.”
“Don’t get tainted by weird things. Have some prejudice. Please.”
Doha pleaded sincerely. Please, have some prejudice, and draw a firm line about your sexual orientation.
Why are you being so scary to the person sharing a room with you?
No matter what, Lim Sehyun must be in heat. Otherwise, why would he spout such nonsense.
“Go to sleep.”
“Why. Aren’t you more curious?”
“I’m not curious.”
“We could watch a video together though?”
“I’m going to sleep.”
In the end, Doha pulled the blanket over himself and turned his back to Sehyun. Looking at the wall was better than looking at Lim Sehyun.
From behind, he could faintly hear the sound of laughter.
‘He was teasing me.’
He was somewhat irritated, but he clearly realized that he had no ability to beat Lim Sehyun in a war of words.
Soon, a familiar melody could be heard from behind him. It was the songs Lim Sehyun had been working on.
Hearing those songs, it finally seemed like the tightly pulled string of tension was disappearing.
Even though he spouts a lot of nonsense, having him here is better than not……
Like that, Doha fell asleep for the second time.
* * *
A few days later, in the car heading to the practice room as usual, Haram suddenly shouted.
“Jackpot! Jackpot! Look at this!”
At Haram’s cry, Doha, who had been dozing off, suddenly became alert.
“What, what? Was there an accident?”
“There was a huge accident.”
Haram showed Doha his phone screen.
News Day_Reporter Yoo Minhyun
(Exclusive) Popular Idol Member A, Urgently Arrested on Drug Control Act Violation Charges
Famous boy group member A (26) was charged by police for violating the Drug Control Act.
The Seoul Gangnam Police Station announced on the night of the 17th that they urgently arrested A at an entertainment establishment in Nonhyeon-dong, Gangnam-gu on drug use charges and are currently investigating.
According to police, a specific 112 report was received stating “Someone is using drugs and causing a disturbance.” When they arrived at the scene, A was unable to control his body and was rambling incoherently, showing abnormal behavior suspected of drug use.
A field reagent test showed a positive reaction for drugs, and police confiscated unidentified powder and drug paraphernalia that A had in his possession as evidence.
A police official stated, “We plan to expand the investigation into habitual use and suppliers.”
[Popular competition program, discussing removal of problematic group……]
[The fall of a popular idol]
[Not just simple use but supply suspicions]
[The production team of the currently filming program stated cautiously, “We are currently assessing the situation, and if proven true, we will completely edit out the member’s footage and discuss whether the team should leave.” Meanwhile, A’s agency is currently unreachable……]
[Comments]
dkwl Wow… I’ve been watching Battle Crown these days and I got chills. Acting so wholesome on broadcast but doing drugs behind the scenes?
888wap So who is it?
happy ㅈㅌㅈ
real I’m an AVN fan… my hands are really shaking… Taejin-ah, please tell me it’s not you… I can’t believe it…
justice Do you believe this? Tsk tsk
“……”
After checking the article, Doha unconsciously looked at Sehyun. Sehyun, whose eyes met his, turned his head and avoided his gaze.
What’s this. Suddenly?
Doha turned his head to the back seat and looked at Eden.
“Did you know?”
“I didn’t know.”
Eden seemed flustered too. His face had turned a bit pale.
“Hyung, you’re not involved in anything……”
Haram carefully asked Eden. The members’ gazes all turned to Sehyun at once.
“I didn’t meet him. Doha hyung and Sehyun strongly blocked it too……”
“What did you two say?”
Yunbeom asked Sehyun.
“Well, it just seemed like he was hanging out with bad quality people, so I told him not to get close.”
“How did you know that?”
“I have such a good personality that I have connections everywhere.”
It was completely unbelievable. Lim Sehyun is a person who lives as if OnX members are his only friends.
“Anyway, you guys have nothing to do with Jo Taejin, right?”
Manager Cheolhwan asked while driving. He seemed quite shocked too.
“Yes~!”
Sehyun answered brightly. Then Cheolhwan let out a sigh of relief.
“There have been rumors like that from time to time. But I didn’t know it was real.”
“This is crazy. But what happens to Battle Crown then?”
The members started to worry about the program.
“Won’t it be cancelled?”
Yunbeom said irritably.
“No way, surely not……”
Haram stared intently at his phone looking for other articles.
‘Hmm……’
Doha’s intuition kicked in. This was something that didn’t activate often, but for once the radar was on. Lim Sehyun humming a tune was suspicious.
You did something, didn’t you.
* * *
In the Battle Crown waiting room, Sehyun’s lips twisted as he checked the article on his phone.
Stupid bastard.
Sehyun had been collecting materials on Jo Taejin using an errand service center. The materials collected over several weeks were packed with evidence. However, most were just photos of his movements from afar and could only predict the circumstances; decisive evidence was lacking.
If he released the materials to reporters, the agency might silence them, and if it fizzled out they would try to hide the evidence, so bursting it all at once was most important.
Sehyun had been thinking all along about when would be the most effective time to make it explode. There shouldn’t be any controversy before Battle Crown properly established itself, but it needed to be resolved before he got deeply entangled with Eden.
That time was right now.
Jo Taejin stupidly fell for it easily. The photo containing his appearance having lost his reason while soaked in drugs was mosaic-censored, but it seemed like Jo Taejin’s face could be seen through those messy pixels.
“Ah, what a relief.”
