Dopamine (4)
It wasn’t a matter of just a day or two. At first, I tried to steel myself and think that way. Malicious comments aimed at me or the flood of baseless articles weren’t exactly new. But this time, something was different. It was the same empty nonsense as always, yet the fire was spreading with an eerily ferocious speed. How had it come to this? Maybe it was because, deep down, there was a grain of truth to it.
“We’ve arrived. Please be careful getting out.”
“Thank you.”
I had skipped the day’s schedule and ridden home in the back seat of the new manager’s car. The fact that Kang Juhyuk sent a DM was completely irrelevant. The director had taken one look at the community posts and immediately sent me home. He scratched at his forehead with a look of total incomprehension, then let out a heavy sigh. For some strange reason, it made me feel sorry.
…It’s not like I did anything wrong. And even if I had, I still hadn’t been caught.
“Ha…”
If you don’t get caught, it isn’t wrong. I used to despise people who said things like that. It was why I had scolded and lectured Hinami before, and why I always tried to maintain proper etiquette even in private.
…Except in front of that man.
In front of him, I never needed to pretend to be good. He was clearly a bad person who had committed unforgivable acts. The karmic price for baring my true nature before someone like him had come full circle and struck me in the back of the head.
I never imagined a retired ex-baseball player could actually harm me. And I certainly never predicted I would end up entangled with him even though he wasn’t actively trying to hurt me. I knew it was arrogant, self-centered thinking, but it stemmed from the simple fact that I really was that superior.
Yet this malice—whose origin I couldn’t even trace—was trying to kill me over nothing more than the tiniest sliver of information about the woman named Seo Jia. Even Kang Juhyuk had only tried to destroy me after learning nearly everything about me.
…Even the manager had only revealed his true colors after working with me for a long time.
“I’m home.”
I stepped into the house where he might be waiting and offered a small greeting. But the living room was just as empty as when I had left. It seemed he hadn’t returned.
I dropped my mentally exhausted body onto the sofa and kept scrolling through the phone I couldn’t tear my eyes from. No matter which site I visited, my name was everywhere. Surprisingly, public opinion wasn’t completely terrible. If I had to quantify it, the ratio was roughly 4:6. Four parts mocking and sneering at me. Six parts calling the articles ridiculous and telling the haters to shut up. That ambiguously reasonable split frightened me more than outright hostility.
…Because if the things that had actually happened were ever fully exposed, that ratio would flip and skew all the way to 9:1.
I had been catching my breath, exhausted by the horrific fantasies, when his DM arrived. The tone sounded worryingly out of character. …Who the hell does he think got me dragged into this scandal?
I harbored those dark thoughts for a moment, but then remembered the absurd reason the scandal had erupted—just a few visits to the gym—and the hostility drained away. No matter how much of a piece of trash Kang Juhyuk was for toying with me, in this particular incident he wasn’t especially guilty.
…And neither was I.
I replied with neither goodwill nor malice, but no answer came back. The fact that he apparently had no interest in continuing the conversation was, for the first time, something I actually liked. I swallowed hard, set the phone down, and rose from the sofa. Looking at any more community posts would only loop the same stories anyway.
Normally I would have played games, but I wasn’t in the mood. I pulled the single remaining can of beer from the fridge and took several gulps on an empty stomach with no snacks. It tasted awful, but nothing else could cut through the tangled mess in my head so effectively.
…Now I finally understood why Hinami kept crying out for alcohol and songs.
“Haah…”
There was no way a few sips of beer would get me drunk, but I pulled on an eye mask and forced myself to sleep.
When I woke up, the agency would handle it. They had already borrowed Kang Juhyuk’s name. One mention of a lawsuit and those crazy bastards would scurry away like rats. So I would just sleep deeply. In my own space where no one could intrude.
My vision shimmered. I tried to lift my eyelids, but they refused to open. My hands, feet, arms, legs—none of them would obey me. I couldn’t summon any strength. It probably wasn’t the alcohol, so what was happening?
The moment I struggled with everything I had to thrash my body, a familiar voice rang beside my ear. The man’s voice was pitched far lower than usual. Goosebumps exploded across my skin. I convulsed, trying to claw my way out of the blankets.
But my body was already pinned by rough hands and could not move.
The clothes I had definitely been wearing were gone. Naked, I was toyed with at his leisure. Slowly. His hand crawled over my bare skin and caressed my throat. He gripped it deliberately, then suddenly tightened his fingers. Just enough to restrict me without cutting off air completely. Just enough that I could still breathe in ragged gasps.
Watching me struggle for breath sent him into ecstasy. He bit into my hair and smeared his fluids across my body. It should have been terrifying, but my body accepted his touch in an unnaturally calm state. My heart didn’t race. My skin didn’t burn. I simply lay there obediently.
Being devoured by him.
He stroked my slightly damp hair and caressed my heart. Pressing on the organ that had grown almost silent, he coaxed it into a faster rhythm. The harder my heart pounded, the more strength returned to my paralyzed limbs. The moment I managed to wiggle my toes with desperate effort, he climbed onto me in reverse, seized my foot, and bit down hard on my big toe.
…It didn’t hurt. He seemed to bite with tremendous force, yet instead of pain I felt only a faint ticklish sensation that never quite arrived. Even when his tongue slid over the top of my foot and traveled slowly up my leg, kissing my pelvis before moving lower, I felt nothing.
Even though it would soon reach the bare flesh between my thighs, no thoughts formed in my mind.
「….」
I could see nothing. Only flickering vision. He pulled his tongue away for a moment, fumbled for something, then pried my mouth open. Something thick filled the obediently parted lips. The breathing that had survived his choking slowly faded.
With my mouth stuffed full, every part of me was violated by him. All I could do was twitch my fingers and toes. Everything had been taken. Gagged so I could make no sound, reduced to nothing but his plaything, my body was used for his amusement. I serviced the cock filling my mouth as if I were grateful.
…Then, gathering every ounce of strength left in my struggling toes, I barely managed to kick him away and tear the eye mask off.
“Haak, haak…”
The room was bright, not dark at all. There was no sign anyone had entered—neither in the room nor on my body. I brushed down the goosebumps covering my skin and touched the toe he had bitten in the dream.
…Of course there was no saliva. My mouth held no lingering sensation of anything having entered it. The only remnant was the memory of labored breathing. I wiped the light sweat from my back, curled up on the bed with my head buried between my knees, and let out a long sigh.
“…I must be losing my mind.”
So broken that I would have a nightmare like that. I had never been this terrified by malicious comments in my entire life. Of course not—none of those accusations had ever been true. I could stand proudly beneath the sky. The people cursing me were the ones in the wrong, not me.
This time, too, everything was groundless slander and fabrication. But unlike before, I could no longer stand with that same proud heart.
“Haah…”
The way he had caressed my body. The way I had nearly been raped. The forced kiss. The cock I had taken into my mouth. All of it was real. I had no right to feel proud.
To moisten my parched mouth I left the bed and walked to the water dispenser. While rinsing out the mouth that felt strangely filthy, water overflowed and soaked me from chin to chest. I wiped it away roughly with my forearm, picked up the phone I had tossed on the sofa, and opened the screen with trembling hands.
“…Ha.”
This time it wasn’t my name on the community boards. It was my older sister’s real name. With shaking fingers I clicked the title. Inside were photos of her from the recent event along with her Instagram link.
Those who had spent the entire day mocking me were surely mixed in among the people now being cursed out. As I read the comments that had completely flipped public opinion—people now attacking the very ones who had attacked me—my chest stung. I couldn’t tell whether it was guilt or envy for how easily my sister could do what I could not.
What the hell are these pathetic losers even talking about? If going to the gym means you’re dating, does that make every woman who works out there Kang Juhyuk’s girlfriend? If the article had been about Hinami I might have understood, but this? Some bottom-tier YouTuber like me posts one Instagram picture and suddenly every outlet is running the story and scrubbing old community posts. That alone tells you their level.
“Pffft…”
Watching every community forum erupt over a single post I wrote filled me with a strange sense of superiority. I wasn’t even that famous. Sure, a few weird comments had appeared on my YouTube channel, but it didn’t matter. Half my subscribers were foreigners anyway. Were they really going to stop watching just because I had a boyfriend? No way.
Besides, once people left my channel, quite a few comments popped up saying “the older sister is better,” and I secretly clicked every like button I could. Honestly, I agreed. Faces are a matter of taste, but body shape has objective standards. If you ignored age, wasn’t I the superior version of Yeeun?
…Ah, but she has more money. Too bad. For now I’d have to settle for being on the same level.
“Sleep well, our Juhyuk.”
The moment he came home he looked exhausted, so I had washed him thoroughly and put him to bed. I stroked his rough hair and smiled faintly. Maybe because he’d been away for two days, the bathroom session earlier had been disappointing. I’d have to scold Hinami about it later. Though with an article like this out, she probably wouldn’t be able to visit comfortably anymore.
Since the article had broken anyway, I hoped it would at least raise my own profile. I wanted to be known as “Seo Haeun,” not “Seo Jia’s older sister.” Look at all the comments saying they’re jealous of Juhyuk. If I could get thousands of them like Jia, that would be perfect.
…Then she wouldn’t need to keep going to that gym either.
“Sleep well, Juhyuk.”
To make the sprawled-out man more comfortable, I slipped under the blanket, buried his nose between my breasts, and gently patted his broad back. Would he be angry when he woke up? Angry that I posted on his Instagram without permission? Part of me hoped he would be. He had been too gentle with me lately.
Just for one day… I wanted to be scolded like I used to be.