I’m not sure. Am I strong? Was I smart?
He didn’t deliberately spit out those words. It was fortunate that much reason remained. While endlessly thinking foolish thoughts about whether there was any way to reverse the breakup, pain stabbed the middle of his solar plexus at Jinho’s words. To feel pain even though no tears came out.
“It’s good that you listened calmly. Thank you for everything until now. I’ll get up first.”
“……Jinho sunbae.”
Muyoung was looking at the face wearing a gentle smile getting up from his seat while looking at him. There was clearly a name that flowed out, but seeing Jinho who showed no reaction, he only confirmed it over and over. Whether he didn’t hear his voice or was pretending not to know, he couldn’t tell, but Jinho was already indifferent to this place and Muyoung. A person who no longer had any influence on him—that’s what he had become.
Muyoung couldn’t do the work of holding onto that Jinho or saying a few more words.
That’s why, even as he slowly finished the payment and called someone, as he watched the fingers of a secretary who wasn’t unfamiliar placing a business card right in front of his face, he couldn’t move.
“Just in case, I’ll leave the secretary’s contact. Is the filming you’re doing now almost finished? Finish it healthily and well. Work hard on activities from now on. And make some friends now.”
“……”
The hand patting his shoulder was warm unlike the words that kept distance. Come to think of it, it had always been like that. No matter how cold it was, he considered the hands that always held him warmly to be the temperature of the kindness and affection he possessed. He considered it a relationship where they could carefully share and return the same amount. It was all an illusion. His gaze was fixed on the firm back of the man going outside after declaring their separation like that.
The end had come this quietly too, so close at hand that even he, the person involved, didn’t know.
He couldn’t move for a long time while looking at the empty seat the other person had left. By the time he barely went outside, it was already the middle of the night.
It was a breakup, but he couldn’t even properly say goodbye. Only now did he remember that. Not “why are we breaking up” or “please don’t go”… just a greeting. Considering it exactly the kind of lingering attachment he would have, Muyoung silently moved his steps to the house where no one would be.
With each step, it felt like the shadows pooling up were trying to swallow him up to his ankles.
* * *
The day was unusually hot. Well, this year was said to be one where a heat wave was forecast from when winter started to fade. In the midst of quickly preparing and continuing filming one after another, the lead actor didn’t arrive, so the wait lengthened endlessly. It was utterly impossible to change the schedule altogether, so everyone repeatedly checked equipment and movements without even being able to avoid the sunlight.
For a while, it was filming inside a studio so he didn’t feel much inconvenience, but once they came out for outdoor filming after a long time and the wait began to lengthen, sighs burst out here and there among those waiting. Even those who didn’t need to do that had long since taken refuge inside vehicles.
Muyoung slightly straightened his back from the chair he had been leaning against. Feeling like his body was slackening before even starting work, he slowly tilted his head side to side and stretched his legs forward long to relax his muscles. He could feel sweat flowing down the back of his neck even in that short time. They said the heat would be severe, but he didn’t know it would be burdensome even with clothes. Looking at towels or ice patches and such attached to the back of the necks of people moving busily, he still thought that waiting like this was a luxury.
He was one of the supporting actors in the drama, so his portion wasn’t particularly large. Even so, when filming, the waiting time became quite long. That too was actually a familiar thing. He knew well enough that it was rare for a seven-year supporting actor to have opportunities to consistently take roles. Complaining about waiting time or weather was a luxury.
“Lee Muyoung-ssi, please stand by!”
“Ah, yes.”
At the staff’s shout informing him of his turn as filming preparations were ready, he organized and stood up. Following the guidance to check his makeup again, he muttered the lines he had memorized in his mouth next to the camera for a moment.
His hair, reflecting the pouring light and tinged with light brown, lost strength and kept spilling forward. He silently received the hands bending down to fix his hair and eyebrows again. His large eyes were covered then revealed as he lowered his eyelids for a moment for the staff moving their hands above Muyoung’s face.
It was work he had been doing slowly building his career one by one during what could be called a long time, but the tension that came right before filming began was still the same. He lightly loosened his lips and moved his steps to the prepared scene.
A scene passed where a woman bidding farewell and a man chasing her trying to hold on to the end had a tussle with each other. Muyoung was in the role of a friend lightly reproaching the man’s foolish choice from the side. They weren’t roles that appeared frequently enough to stand by for every filming, but they were the kinds of roles Muyoung often took on that were too ambiguous for just anyone to use.
“We’ll go for the shot soon~!”
The moment the lights turned on for filming preparation, his head spun dizzily. His long neck momentarily swayed and bent down deeply before he came to his senses. His vision momentarily blurred and he was startled, but when he quickly came to his senses, his sight returned. That was fortunate. After checking his surroundings, Muyoung let out a sigh only after confirming that no one was paying attention to him.
The symptoms he had been experiencing since breaking up with Jinho a few months ago were more severe than expected. He threw up what he ate at the slightest thing, and felt nauseous even when he hadn’t eaten anything. There were also headaches where his head rang and his vision became hazily blurred.
He had just let his guard down thinking there were no symptoms particularly today. Even so, he didn’t show signs of being sick at the filming site. He clenched his fists and closed his eyes, waiting for the symptoms to calm down, then lifted his eyelids again with effort.
These moments of getting used to the breakup like this were awkward and unfamiliar. There were only strange emotions he couldn’t understand when they were two.
Now he was alone in the world.
* * *
“Are you going straight home today too?”
“I should. Why? Is there something today?”
Section Manager Kim in the driver’s seat spoke to Muyoung, who was sitting in the van leaning his body against the seat and catching his breath. It had been quite a long time since he had worked with him, but the words checking on his return home today sounded strange.
Kim Jungchul was the person who said things like: our Muyoung is the best because he doesn’t cause trouble, it’s better to go to many places and work well even if you’re a bit less famous than kids who become famous and cause accidents somewhere, call me instead of other people when you’re bored and play, there aren’t any proper humans among the people who try to tempt you for no reason. He was someone who gave examples citing various behind-the-scenes gossip of the entertainment industry to make him cautious.
Even CEO Choi Younghoon, who had cast him and been with him until now, was someone who said you should play when you can play and asked if Muyoung, you’re okay living so boringly like that, but Section Manager Kim, who was always together, was cautious about everything.
“What work? I was just thinking about going to eat something delicious together because you’ve been looking tired for no reason lately. You need to eat well in summer. You’re already thin in body and white in face, so if you lose more weight, you’ll be a patient. If you suddenly collapse like last year, my heart will drop again.”
“That was, I’m telling you it was just a cold……”
“The hospital contacted us for a cold? Your lies are flimsy too. As an actor, how do you even act? With your face?”
At Section Manager Kim’s words teasing with giggles, Muyoung sighed and shook his head. Since he lived alone and had no family, all emergency contacts were set to the company. Considering the characteristics of the profession of acting, he judged it would be better to be connected to the company when problems occurred in his personal life so there wouldn’t be disruptions to work, something decided from the time of the contract.
Even if not for that, the contacts saved in Muyoung’s phone were extremely few. CEO Choi and Section Manager Kim, some broadcasting station officials and writers, and a past lover he hadn’t been able to delete yet. Even CEO Choi, who had been relieved about Muyoung’s passive human relationships at debut, was now worried, asking if there weren’t more actors he knew.
“You came to the hospital right away and checked, yet you’re still like that.”
“Of course I should go! It would be stranger for the company not to at least take their affiliated actor to the hospital even if they can’t bring them there when they’re sick, right?”
Was that so? He thought so and closed his mouth tightly because he was the one hiding something.
It had long been the case that everyone at the affiliated company encouraged each other that there would definitely be good news at the end of steadfastness. It was all thanks to CEO Choi and Section Manager Kim running Hoon Entertainment.
In the early debut days, CEO Choi Younghoon alone handled everything for him. In fact, it was a small company that could be said to be just the company and himself. It was a start of just one small office and a few computers, but CEO Choi’s skill, having worked quite tenaciously in the industry, was good. After mainly doing background appearances and connecting broadcasting stations with agencies, he grabbed the hand that said his eyes were perfectly caught by him and he couldn’t refuse.
He was able to work until now thanks to the efforts of CEO Choi Younghoon, who talked to him at a regular performance of the theater club he had been doing haphazardly during college, asking what he liked about him. Of course, at that time, CEO Choi might have had an ambitious plan to succeed by putting forward a fresh newcomer after founding the company and continuing to circle in the same place.
He bent his waist so his nose hit his own legs and bowed while handing out drinks at filming sites he didn’t even need to follow to. He took Muyoung around broadcasting stations to introduce him to officials. He said an actor needs a manager even for minor roles and supporting roles to be treated well, and was constantly attached to him, looking after him. The fact that Muyoung’s portions gradually increased and his lines became more numerous was all impossible without CEO Choi’s efforts.
The passionate CEO Choi, who made Muyoung, who had only imitated acting, receive training to the point where he could make a living, was still together with him until now. He was a good person who trusted him, who was completely alone without family, with no conditions and even followed his greed to want to graduate from school normally. Section Manager Kim was no different from such CEO Choi.
“Yes, I understand. Let’s eat dinner together, Section Manager Kim. I’ll feast thanks to you today.”
“Right, you thought well. CEO Choi was nagging at me saying you’ve gotten terribly gaunt lately. You don’t even go out well anywhere because you have no friends.”
