Chapter 92
“Get your hands off of Tae-Yoon!” Yeon-Hoon suddenly jumped out.
Even my aunt, who was preparing to slap me on the cheek, became a little surprised and faltered.
“Who are you to hit our Tae-Yoon!” Yeon-Hoon stood in front of me to block my aunt and shouted at the top of his lungs; he had a very determined look on his face. He shouted again, “Why are you trying to hit another person!”
My aunt seemed quite taken aback by the sudden intrusion of a third party, but she was not the type of person to back down from an intervention of this level. She was the type of person who had to see through things to the very end until her anger dissolved.
“Hey! What the! Who the hell are you!”
It was not a question hoping for an actual answer, but Yeon-Hoon replied clearly, “I’m Tae-Yoon’s hyung! How can you act like this when you’re his aunt? Can you answer that?” He even replied with a question, and I had no idea how Yeon-Hoon could stand his ground so firmly like this.
‘He knows she’s my aunt.’ It seemed he overheard my conversation with my aunt a little bit. But this was not the important part now. He shouldn’t be yelling like this in front of my aunt. Of course, it didn’t matter to me but—
“You fucking rude bastard, how dare you raise your voice in front of your elder!”
I couldn’t let Yeon-Hoon get hit. My crazy aunt raised her hand and poised to slap his cheek. I wish I could have punched her, but I couldn’t; so, I needed to be hit instead.
Swoosh.
I pushed Yeon-Hoon behind me and then—
Slap—!
I was slapped in the face by my aunt instead.
“Tae-Yoon!” Yeon-Hoon screamed in surprise. Frankly, it didn’t hurt. I used to get hit harder than this and didn’t think too much about it.
‘I’m within the view of the CCTV.’ We were at an angle that would have been clearly caught by both cameras, and I was sure that this sound was clearly recorded on the phone that I had in my pocket.
“This crazy…!” My aunt looked quite surprised when I suddenly intervened and got slapped. A normal person would have taken a step back from here but—
“Ha, yeah. This is great. I should’ve beaten the crap out of you. Come closer so I can hit you more. I’ll smash your face today so you won’t ever dream of being an idol.” This crazy woman was not going to stop; she needed to see me fall into ruins.
It was because of this damn personality that she lost hundreds of millions of won and drove her house to ruins. If things didn’t work out even after speculation, she put in more money in a fit of anger. And she blew money by buying stocks and then selling it out of anger again and again. Even when she was gambling, she still kept on going even when she knew she was losing.
“I need to release my anger if I can’t get paid. Come here you brat. I’ll kill you here today.” My aunt rolled up her sleeves with a deep scowl; that was her sign that she was going to hit me with all her might now. Even when I was young, I gave up on resisting whenever she made that motion and expression. Was it because I had memories of getting mercilessly hit until I was half-dead? I didn’t feel any fear or anything about her movement just now, but—
“I said don’t hit him—!” Yeon-Hoon shouted. However, his voice was so loud that even my aunt faltered.
‘What?’ Honestly, I was also surprised. I knew that Yeon-Hoon had a strong voice as I could tell by his singing. However, now that he was really trying his best to shout as loudly with all his might, I felt like my eardrums would burst.
Furthermore, the café owner, the grandpa, joined, “What are you all doing here! You can’t do this at someone’s store.” Frankly, I thought he had been waiting for a chance to stop us for a while and finally found the right time to intervene. Was it because two third parties had rushed in and were trying to stop her?
“Ha, ha! I’m flabbergasted…” My aunt finally backed down a bit.
“Get out now! Right now!” The café owner kicked us out. And we were kicked out of the café just like that. Even when we were kicked out into the middle of the street, my aunt kept glaring at me.
“You, just wait, I’ll kill you for real.” She told me she would kill me so many times that I now felt nothing from it. Did my indifferent expression only trigger her further?
“Hey! You think what I’m saying is a joke! I’m really going to kill you!” Her words got stronger.
Yeon-Hoon grabbed my wrist as if to pull me away from this situation. I felt sorry for Yeon-Hoon, but I still had a conversation to finish with this crazy woman.
I said, “Excuse me but stop yelling your head off when you literally have nothing. My eardrums are about to burst.”
“What? What did you say, you bastard?”
“Don’t spew so many curses when you’re old. You look pathetic.”
“Hey!”
“And don’t ever come to find me again or tell anyone you’re my family. Lastly, don’t even think about asking me for money.”
“Bong Tae-Yoon!”
“Let’s never meet again.” I planned to return like that but that crazy woman decided to cross the line.
“I’m going to tell everyone in Korea that you’re an imbecile who killed your parents!” She shouted for the whole world to hear, “How dare a monster who killed both his parents act like a human in a broadcast show? You’re a fucking bastard who has to live like a corpse forever to atone for your parents! Know your fucking place!” I’ve heard this same repertoire so many times since I was young that it didn’t faze me in the least anymore.
However, the fact that she was shouting all this in such a public area was quite annoying.
“T-Tae-Yoon.” I let go of Yeon-Hoon’s hand for a moment.
Then I walked toward the bitch who called herself my aunt. “Who did you call an imbecile?”
I knew that I shouldn’t hit her, but I felt like I might really hit her in my current state. I said, “My parents died in an accident, and I just survived that accident.” Honestly, these were memories that I didn't want to recall or even think about. However, this nasty woman kept forcing me to recall my past memories.
I added, “You said I killed my parents? Stop shouting nonsense.”
“You were fated to be a killer from the moment you were born. A shaman said that your fate was full of death! I should have listened to her then, so I wouldn’t have ended up in this mess.”
“Oh, really?” The words that I was fated to be a killer- that was also something I had heard till my ears bled. But now I could really see myself killing someone.
“You think it would help your image if rumors spread that you killed your parents when you want to be a celebrity? Do you have a brain?” My aunt began threatening me again.
She must have thought this would work, but honestly, I didn’t care. “Spread it. As soon as you spread this rumor, I’ll go to Kim Minji.” All I had to do was threaten her back.
“You said I was fated to be a killer.” I took a step closer to my aunt. “And that I killed my parents? That’s complete bullshit.” My aunt was not someone I could reason with in the first place. “But think carefully about it. Don’t you think social death is also another form of death?”
“Yooooou!” My aunt once again tried to grab me by the hair but—
Tap.
I dodged her arms by turning slightly. Then I took another step toward her and said, “I'll make your daughter’s life extremely painful and tiring so that she’ll never be able to show her face ever again outside.”
“If you ever touch Minji, I’ll kill you even if doing so brings me down! You got that?”
“Then do it. I won’t just stand still.” The woman calling herself my aunt began to go full-on bonkers. It was her turn to raise her hand one more time, but—
Squeeze.
I grabbed her wrist first, and when I squeezed it with a bit of strength…
“Kyahhhh!” She screamed at the top of her voice.
“If you try to wreck my future, I’ll wreck your daughter’s future, and if you ever appear in front of me again, I won’t stay still then. You got that?” I said while looking down at this crazy woman. “If you want your daughter to be safe, behave carefully.”
After hearing all this, my aunt slumped down to the ground and looked up at me in a daze.
“Don’t forget that I can socially bury your daughter even while sitting in the corner of a room.” I turned away, leaving behind my aunt on the ground. Despite pouring out everything I had prepared, my heart didn’t feel completely at ease.
Sigh.
However, I couldn’t show my weakness here. I walked nonchalantly and saw Yeon-Hoon standing on the other side. His facial expression looked quite conflicted and hard to read. I didn’t know why; I’ve never felt like this before but I couldn’t make eye contact with him now.
‘…That’s strange.’
“Tae-Yoon.” Yeon-Hoon reached out his hand to me. But—
“…Let’s go, Yeon-Hoon.” I didn’t have the strength to hold that hand now.
* * *
Yeon-Hoon and I didn’t speak a word to each other while heading back. Yeon-Hoon followed, and I led the way the whole time. When we reached our dorm, I faced him again. He had an apologetic look on his face.
“I didn’t…intend to see it.” And for some reason, he was now starting to make excuses. “I came out to buy coffee for the members before morning practice and happened to overhear your conversation. At first, I thought it sounded too personal so I was going to leave, but I was so surprised that she was going to hit you that my body just moved on its own…”
There was no need for Yeon-Hoon to apologize.
‘Seriously, what’s up with me?’ I felt uncomfortable. Was it because I showed him a side I didn’t want to show him? I had no courage to make eye contact with him.
“…No, you don’t have anything to apologize for. Thank you for taking my side,” I said to Yeon-Hoon.
My heart hadn’t felt comfortable when I got caught by Woon last time, and the same was true for now. No, it was worse than that time as my aunt hadn’t shown up in person then.
“Tae-Yoon.” Yeon-Hoon called my name again in a low voice. When I couldn’t hold my head up—
Squeeze.
Yeon-Hoon approached me and gave me a hug. “You suffered a lot, Tae-Yoon.” A similar scene as before began to unfold.
“…” I hadn’t felt like this even after leaving behind my aunt, but now my heart felt heavy as if something was broken.
“You did well, Tae-Yoon. It’s all right.” I hadn’t realized that a rhythmic patting on the back could be such a big form of consolation. And like this, I stood in front of our dorms and stayed still for a very long time.
* * *
Perhaps due to the hectic and rough start I had as soon as I woke up, I couldn’t concentrate much on anything all morning that day. Fortunately, my mental breakdown didn’t seem to have affected the competition much as the percentage of winning didn’t change.
[Probability of winning: 80%]
Since I was used to practicing, I could now do all the movements without much difficulty. After lunchtime passed like this, dinner also passed, and we finished evening practice.
“Today is the last day of training camp. Thank you for following my lead even though you must have had to practice a lot.” The practice ended after Kang Hyun-Sung’s closing remarks.
“Whoa!”
“It feels a bit relieving but sad at the same time.”
“But I think we were able to thoroughly prepare for our stage thanks to this camp.”
“Since we still have time until the competition on the 24th, let’s do our best until the end.”
We left the practice room after saying appropriate comments like this. The production crew didn’t prepare any event or anything like that to commemorate the last day of camp. All they did was prepare a dinner that day in a buffet style that was a bit more generous than usual.
Although they kept on shooting, it was material that would be aired for about five seconds and had no script. I lay in bed and reflected on what had happened that day. It was a normal day overall except for the fuss in the morning. My heart felt a bit heavy, but I thought time would solve it.
Knock, knock.
Then someone knocked on my door. It was the first time someone knocked on my door since I came here. When I opened the door, wondering what was going on—
“…Guys?” My members were standing in front of the door. I wondered why they were standing in front.
“Tae-Yoon, let’s go.”
“…?”
“Yeon-Hoon said he borrowed a car.”
“…What?’
“We told the producer that we were going on a drive at night, and he gave us a camera and permission to go out as long as we got some footage of us playing for a bit.”
It appeared a lot of things had been talked about without my knowledge. However, I didn’t feel like going. I felt apologetic to the members, but I wondered if I should go with them when—
[Probability of winning: 81%]
The percentage, which had not budged so far, suddenly rose.
“…Yes, let’s go.” In the end, I came out with my coat.
This chapter is updat𝓮d by fre(e)webnov(l).com