“Why exactly do you keep following me around?”
His entire body was wrapped in a smooth dark-colored shirt. A suit tailored like a knife fitted only to him rippled with his movements. He was a man splendid even in the air he breathed.
“Don’t say such hurtful things.”
Speaking playfully, he opened the trunk. Colorful balloons surged up all at once. Pink ribbons fluttered, and plump balloons swayed. Even lush roses were lavishly decorated.
And the man grabbed something and dragged it out. How much had he beaten them? Both their faces and bodies were stained with blood. But those faces, weren’t they strangely familiar?
“Crazy, has that guy really gone insane, fuck….”
What the hell is that again? At that appearance no different from a human butcher, Woonghee frowned. Who could it be, it was those bastards. The ones who had been looking at Woonghee as if he were sweet-smelling fruit flesh, licking him with their eyes, before they smashed their heads into the electric pole.
“Wasn’t this what Woonghee-ssi was looking for?”
No way. Woonghee put down Jjokko from his arms for a moment. He placed Jjokko in the arms of Daehyung, that gorilla bastard standing on one side.
“Stay here for a bit.”
Because that man is too harmful for this soft baby. Stomp, stomp, when he trampled on the guys sprawled on the street with his walker, they bounced up making “Uuk!” sounds.
“It was you, wasn’t it?”
Approaching the man, Woonghee lifted his chin sharply. Then he asked ominously.
“Lee Woonghee-ssi’s words keep getting shorter.”
“Don’t deflect.”
Lest others might hear, he twisted his head with his nose buried close to his nape. It was a precarious distance where a finger could barely fit. To others it would look like they were kissing, but.
“You’re the one who did that to Director Hwang, aren’t you?”
Woonghee was suspecting him. He let out ticklish breaths. Ah, Gi Junhyuk sighed, his thick nape rumbling low. He dropped the head from his hand with a thud, then shrugged the ends of his broad shoulders.
“Uuk….”
The head was crushed on the asphalt floor, and a squelching sound echoed through the street.
“You mean me?”
As if he had no idea what this was about, the man cutely wrinkled his nose bridge. Taking off the black gloves he was wearing one by one, he handed them to his subordinate.
“Well, I don’t really know what you’re talking about.”
He even tilted his head, but Woonghee only twisted his lips.
“Don’t pretend you don’t know so disgustingly.”
Then the man frowned his beautiful brows as if asking how he could use such speech. As if he had seen the dirtiest and most vulgar thing in the world. His face was so innocent that it was almost laughable. When he was the one who had just dragged out two meatballs beaten nearly to death from the trunk.
“Woonghee-ssi’s speech is too rough. You should speak gently.”
“I’m talking about Director Hwang.”
Don’t disgustingly pretend not to know, Woonghee pressed him.
Wasn’t it suspicious no matter how you looked at it? Even if Director Hwang’s head was cracked, would he really do something like that?
…Wasn’t he someone blinded by his own success? And yet he played around so promiscuously before the awards ceremony. While leaving so much evidence.
Moreover, there were a total of 3 Omega models at that drinking party, and all three of them were captured in the frame.
That meant there was someone else who took the photo. Who could it be, exactly. That third party.
“That’s why you’re making me so anxious.”
The man asked in a voice that sounded like his insides were melting. While cupping Woonghee’s cheeks with his large hands. The heat from his hot palms seeped into Woonghee’s pale skin.
“You don’t want the house I bought you, don’t want the car, don’t want the acting role….”
The man let out an anguished groan as if all this was the fault of the indifferent Woonghee. So to vent his anger, he turned those people into pulp like that.
“Even though you said you love me.”
You shouldn’t have said it like that then. At his mournful voice, around them flash, flash, flashes went off. Whether they were mistaking it for filming a movie, they were all taking pictures in unison. No doubt they were plastering it all over SNS again.
“You’re making me lonely.”
Shouldn’t this guy be the one doing the acting? Look, even now isn’t he protecting his left side? His eyes were full of melancholy.
The sparkling neon lights of Southeast Asia pierced his eyes, scattering and squeezing Woonghee’s heart tightly.
“…….”
Woonghee couldn’t continue his words. The man always rendered him powerless like this. When he acted so vulnerable, Woonghee couldn’t hug him, couldn’t kiss him, nor could he hold him in his arms and put him to sleep.
It felt like not knowing the answer.
…Should this be called yearning? Or should it be called lovely?
So Woonghee muttered like an excuse.
“Well, this isn’t an island.”
He spat out the words as if crushing them.
“I’m standing here on Philippine soil right now, with both my arms and both my legs intact. Why should I use your money?”
“I told you, I’m not doing this for free.”
As if gently coaxing Woonghee, he recited his words softly like a minstrel.
“Appear in my film. I need you.”
The man stepped back one step and dramatically spread his arms, as if presenting his world to Woonghee. And behind him, that damn billboard appeared again. Damn it, that again. Fabulous. He couldn’t escape from that movie. Wasn’t it floating everywhere like the moon?
“Don’t you want to become the protagonist appearing in that film?”
“Didn’t you hear what Lee Ijun said?”
That it lowers my status, that it’s vulgar, that porn or school violence exposés that I don’t even know where I filmed might explode.
“Even though people want Woonghee-ssi? It’s too wasteful to let you rot like this.”
Pfft, Woonghee snickered and laughed. How could someone like me show my face on that screen? Movies aren’t some cheap joke.
“You’d be becoming the protagonist of your own life, Woonghee-ssi.”
That’s ridiculous. How would I become the protagonist of my own life? For someone like me who just lives breathing since birth, it was too grand a statement. How many times do I have to remind you, and remind you again? Woonghee continued like a sigh.
“I’m going to become a Beta.”
Anyway, those people surrounding him would surely turn their backs soon. Woonghee would soon return to being an ordinary, plain Beta.
His skin would lose its luster, his eyelashes would become short as if clipped with nail clippers, his muscles would build easily, and he wouldn’t emit any fragrance anymore. Interest would naturally fade like that.
Then the man burst into laughter, his chest heaving like an oxygen tank.
“Woonghee-ssi still hasn’t let go of that dream?”
As if Woonghee had spouted nonsense. Woonghee shoved the helmet back onto his face and retorted.
“I’m saying I want to live normally.”
Normal, the man chewed on that word as if rolling it on his tongue. Behind him, Fabulous’s brilliant action scene flashed by. It was the subway chase scene that Woonghee had filmed his ass off.
It was a scene that had to be shot on top of a moving subway while wearing wires, truly dog training. Whatever that damn realism was, his legs trembled just standing still on the subway cutting through the air.
“What exactly is that normal life Woonghee-ssi is talking about?”
Do I have to explain what a normal life is for you to understand, this man? Right, in your dictionary where even your earlobe and every eyebrow hair is perfect, that kind of thing wouldn’t be written.
“Living without catching anyone’s eye, just receiving a regular monthly salary. When I get a bonus, buying chicken modestly, ordering pig’s feet, sending Woongju to college well, seeing her get married….”
He didn’t even need to squeeze it out. These were thoughts Woonghee always had while going around part-time jobs until he was worn out. He could just pour them out like pressing a button on a vending machine.
As he was rattling off words so carelessly, wasn’t the man’s gaze growing colder and colder?
“I’m not there.”
Flinch, Woonghee’s fingers trembled. It was a fact he hadn’t thought of at all. Right, it was unconscious. He had been accepting that naturally there would be no man in his life as a Beta.
“Well, that’s because.”
Woonghee wanted to continue his words. No, more than that, there was something he wanted to ask precisely.
If he became a Beta, he would become like a flower that lost its fragrance, and would wither someday. Even so, could he still be by his side?
“Just because you become something like a Beta….”
The man lifted one corner of his mouth and smiled coldly. Then, as if picking up and putting back the emotions that burst out, he covered his mouth with his large hand.
“Right, there’s still time left. Think about it slowly.”
But his voice was unclear. He could feel him gritting his teeth.
“Come here, don’t be like that.”
The man barely suppressed his anger and reached out both hands to Woonghee, saying let’s go enjoy a banquet. Woonghee naturally couldn’t refuse his touch.
***
A few days after that.
Woonghee was sitting in the waiting room with a very tense face. Trembling, trembling, gripping his shaking knees, he was waiting for his turn.
[Please come in, Woonghee Lee.]
Finally his name was called. Woonghee turned his head sharply to look at the injection room. What had to come had come. Now it was finally his turn.
“Y-yes!”
Creak creak, he walked like a robot and entered the injection room. A doctor wearing a faded white gown was sitting there and pushed out a cold chair.
[Please sit here.]
When the nurse approached and grabbed his arm, his skin suddenly flinched in the cold air. The sensation of the yellow rubber band tightly squeezing his forearm and veins bulging was transmitted. Soon the bespectacled doctor approached. While pulling the piston of the syringe.
[Relax.]
Thump thump, his heart beat vividly like a live fish. I-is that the Beta injection? That sharp needle kept approaching. Soon it poked shallowly into his skin.
“W-wait a moment!”
Woonghee raised his palm as if having a seizure. Asking to stop for a moment. Cold sweat dripped down his spine.
