I Knew This Would Happen
He knew this was coming.
“...Yeah.”
Lee Dahyun scrolled down with a grave expression on her face. Kwak Dohyun, who had been chatting idly with Lee Seowon, began to feel the silence pressing in on him. The king of company dinners had gone home, and with Yoon Jay — the ultimate restraint on her — out of the picture, Lee Dahyun should have been chattering his ear off with delight. Instead, she was far too quiet.
“Dahyun-ssi, what are you doing?”
“Hm? Oh...”
“What is it?”
“It's... something about Jay came up.”
At her words, everyone pulled out their phones and started searching. It wasn't hard to find. Yoon Jay was the kind of person who topped the search results the moment you typed in nothing but his surname.
He was a man whose past made people curious in spite of themselves. A newcomer who had appeared out of nowhere, snatched up a supporting role, and rocketed to Rising Star status on the strength of a single work.
Then it came to light that he was the half-brother of a famous pair of idol twins, and suddenly everyone wanted to know his family history. Combined with the magazine interview mentioning the various jobs he'd held, people with time on their hands set out to dig into his past.
The source of the information was a single netizen.
My cousin lives in LA so I showed her a picture and asked if it could be him, and she recognized him right away. Turns out he was one of the firefighters at the 115 Disaster last year
I looked it up and the photos are there, and I'm pretty sure this is him, right?
The incident had been big enough to make the eight o'clock news even in Korea.
Students running a secret drug party — and then committing an irreversible crime. The fire crews who happened to be nearby and arrived early, the firefighters who infiltrated the building, and the rescue operation that followed.
Since it had happened just last year, there was plenty of material. And the special report the local broadcaster had aired on it was still up on MyTube.
“Oh...”
“Team Leader, what should we do?”
The phones of the newly hired marketing team members buzzed noisily. Before long, Lee Dahyun's work phone rang too.
She declined the call, and messages exploded onto her screen. Then the phone rang again — a reporter from a different outlet this time. It was meant to be fact-checking, but with some reporters copy-pasting community posts straight into articles, a few stories had already gone up on the portals.
“Should I call him?”
“Hold on.”
Why would you call him over something that wasn't even his fault? Lee Seowon held back Han Jinwoo, who looked ready to dial at any second.
[Why didn't you tell us you used to be a firefighter? We don't do that kind of cheap marketing even when we could.]
[I know you wouldn't. It's just... I never felt the need to bring it up.]
[Fair enough.]
He had sensed something faintly off about Yoon Jay's face before. So that was why he'd hidden his previous career — he hadn't wanted something like this to come to light.
Yoon Jay had been a mystery from the moment they first met until now. People always tangled him up in something, but past a certain line, he simply kept his mouth shut and answered everything with a smile.
Still, the way he had so matter-of-factly revealed his trauma earlier had felt like an act of opening up, and that had been oddly reassuring. Which meant Lee Seowon ought to do something about this.
If you just leave it alone, it'll blow over eventually.
At the end of the day, these things only raged on the internet — people who didn't use social media much often passed by without ever hearing about them.
The problem was that Yoon Jay had risen far too suddenly. By any honest measure, his surge was on the level of an idol who'd seized the center spot on a survival show that dominated the conversation and debuted off the back of it.
Even without a next project lined up, ad requests kept pouring in, and he'd even received offers to appear in a drama in a leading role.
With news like this on the table, would reporters really sit still? They'd slather on every kind of seasoning imaginable just to bait clicks.
“Let's bury it.”
“Bury it with what?”
“One moment.”
Besides, now that this was out there, the topic was bound to come up sooner or later — in an interview, somewhere, sometime. But... Lee Seowon picked up the phone and called someone. Scandals like this were usually best buried under dating rumors, but that would be too much.
“Sungho hyung, are you busy right now?”
(What is it? Your voice sounds suspicious.)
“Hyung. Let's announce you're joining our company. Now.”
(What? Isn't that way too early?)
“I'll handle CEO Shin myself. That work for you?”
It wasn't a request for permission so much as a notification, but thankfully the other man simply told him to do as he pleased. Listening in, Lee Dahyun fired off messages to the press.
“Hello, Yujin-ssi? Sorry to call on your day off.”
(Director Lee. What can I do for you?)
“How about we announce your move to our agency right now?”
Two flagship actors — the very faces keeping their agency fed — suddenly transferring to a brand-new one. All they had to do was break that news and ask that the Yoon Jay articles be taken down.
“Hey, Minjae. You think it's alright if we announce your casting in Director Lim Sanghoon's film right now?”
(Doesn't matter to me... but have you talked it over with our CEO?)
“I'll take care of that. Thanks.”
It was a tangle of promotion schedules, advertising commitments, and other complications — but untangling it was simple, because Lee Seowon was, quietly, an influential investor and a master of connections.
“About that Yoon Jay article that just went up.”
(Dahyun-ssi, if something like this happens, you tell us first. We could've seasoned it nicely and posted it for you...)
“No — take it down, please.”
(What? Why? It's not bad press. It's a great opportunity — I did some digging on SNS and apparently he was a total hero back in LA.)
“He doesn't want it known. I'll give you something else instead.”
Lee Dahyun and her team members, busy firing off messages and taking calls, grabbed their bags, saying they'd have to head back to the office.
“Keeping two fussy actors in line is exhausting.”
Lee Seowon sighed as he hung up. But his expression wasn't all that bad.
Oblivious to the brief commotion that had interrupted the pleasant company dinner, Yoon Jay set out on his schedule the next day.
“Morning, hyung.”
“Did something happen?”
“Sorry?”
Han Jinwoo hurriedly checked his own face in the rearview mirror. What was that? And here he'd thought he was pretty good at keeping his expressions in check.
“Something feels different about you today.”
Does the man have some kind of animal instinct? Han Jinwoo swallowed hard.
“Hyung, it's... about the 115 Disaster.”
“...So it got out.”
It had rained in the night, so he hadn't been able to sleep properly, and his dreams had been a mess too. So that was why. Yoon Jay let out a sigh.
“I expected this would happen anyway. Don't worry about it.”
That explained why Yoon Dojun and Yoon Dohwa — supposed to be in the thick of a busy promotion period — had suddenly started messaging him out of nowhere. He turned his gaze to the window, and Han Jinwoo pressed his lips together and focused on the road.
“The CEO said he'd bury it under something else.”
“Did he?”
Personally, yes — he would rather that incident never come to light. It wouldn't be buried completely, of course, but he made a mental note to thank Lee Seowon properly later.
He arrived at the studio for the additional shoot for a major fashion platform's ad campaign. A few of the staff — the type who kept a close eye on community reactions — kept stealing glances at him.
“All right, that should do it. Great work, everyone!”
“Thank you for your hard work.”
The moment he finished the shoot with practiced ease and turned to head for his next schedule, someone approached him cautiously. It was an employee from the advertiser's side.
“Um...”
“Yes?”
“Stay strong.”
The shoot was already over. Stay strong for what, exactly? Yoon Jay blankly accepted the vitamin drink the man held out.
Truthfully, he knew exactly what the drink meant. Han Jinwoo had told him that the communities had been buzzing a little about his past just yesterday.
“...Thank you.”
He wasn't entirely sure how to feel about the kindness.
In the end, he never drank the vitamin drink. He left it sitting in the car.
Once every schedule was done, his destination was the broadcasting station.
Yoon Jay was currently juggling two projects at once — what Kwak Dohyun liked to call a "high-end trashy drama," and the work of a rookie screenwriter. One was pre-produced, so as long as the schedules were coordinated, it was manageable. It would keep him a little busy, but if anything, being busy suited him fine.
“Hello, nice to meet you. It's an honor, seonsaengnim.”
“The pleasure's mine. I'm Woo Taeyoon, the writer of Daldongne.”
Woo Taeyoon pushed up his constantly slipping glasses and studied Yoon Jay. He'd been nervous about meeting someone so famous lately, but the man's courteous manner left a good first impression.
“Thank you for making time for me despite your schedule.”
“Not at all. I was in the area anyway.”
A rookie screenwriter was in no position to summon a rising star like Yoon Jay at will. And yet when Yoon Jay had received his call, he'd answered readily, asking only what day suited him.
“Honestly, the reason I asked to meet is that I wanted to talk about the work.”
“Good.”
He meant it, too. The writer standing before him was the creator of the character Yoon Jay would wear. Every scrap of information he could gather was valuable.
“Um... why my work, of all things? Sanghyun isn't exactly a cool character in the story.”
Park Sanghyun — the character Yoon Jay would be playing in Daldongne — could be summarized in one line as a spoiled-brat delinquent with a silver spoon. He made his very first appearance whining to his father about why the system wouldn't exempt him from military service and only reassign him to alternate service instead.
A Rising Star at Yoon Jay's level would normally guard his image and stick to cool, flattering roles. No wonder the writer harbored more than a few preconceptions.
“Because I believe he's the character you've poured the most care into. I liked how a prejudiced trust-fund kid is slowly moved by people who live without much and still share a warm kind of love with each other.”
“That's... yes, exactly.”
But the more he talked with him, the more Yoon Jay appreciated how seriously the man took his work. Woo Taeyoon's expression gradually eased.
“Personally, I think Sanghyun redeems himself later on.”
“Right! That's why I loved watching you in Along Along, Jay-ssi.”
“Thank you for the compliment.”
The meeting ended on a warm note. The writer clearly loved each and every one of his characters — and so, as it happened, did Yoon Jay.
Han Jinwoo had gone to pull the car around, and Yoon Jay, left alone, felt someone come to a stop beside him and turned his head.
Im Siwoo, was it.
The actor Kim Joohwan had tried to push onto Jo Youkyeong — the one who'd glared at Yoon Jay with unconcealed resentment after Jo Youkyeong, showing her hand far too obviously, promoted Yoon Jay instead, and he ended up overshadowed.
“Does it feel good, getting attention over something like that?”
“...I'm not sure what you mean.”
“Playing dumb? Well, I'll grant you can act a little.”
He felt no particular need to respond to someone who'd skipped the greeting entirely and jumped straight to hostility. Im Siwoo ground his teeth at the man's attitude — not even looking at him properly, answering everything with dismissive indifference.
“Look at that. You're making me spell it out. This whole scheme of selling your past, selling your sob story, to get famous.”
He kept needling Yoon Jay. In the heart of Im Siwoo, a walking ball of inferiority complex, Yoon Jay's image was ugly.
He'd swallowed every rumor whole — that a pretty face like his had landed him sponsors, that he'd worked as a bodyguard for fashion figures before debut just to catch a break, that he was now deliberately milking fragments of his past for fame.
“Turns out his half-siblings are idols too, so he gets the buzz that comes with that. And now he lets his past leak out just enough to suck up the fame. That's the play, isn't it? Use all of that, and you don't even have to bruise your pride—”
Im Siwoo couldn't finish the sentence. Yoon Jay had turned his head and was looking straight at him.
Wh-what is with this man's eyes...?
The problem was, Yoon Jay's presence was anything but ordinary. Even a man who knew nothing could feel the bloodlust in that gaze — the look of someone who had, at the very least, casually killed more than a few people.
A sneer curling at the edge of his mouth, Yoon Jay stepped toward him. Under the slowly crushing weight of his presence, Im Siwoo couldn't draw a proper breath. And the moment Yoon Jay raised his arm—
“Gah!”
Im Siwoo, who'd squeezed his eyes shut in terror, jolted at the touch landing on his shoulder and collapsed backward onto the ground.
“...You had some dust on your right shoulder.”
“......”
“Though I don't think that warranted falling over.”
Yoon Jay did not reach out to help him up. Han Jinwoo, arriving with the car just then, had already planted himself in front of him.
“Was everything all right with that man?”
“Nothing worth mentioning.”
“If you have no more schedules, I'll head home.”
“Sure.”
On the drive home, Yoon Jay gazed out the window and let out a quiet breath.
He knew this was coming.
The moment he had shown his face in the media again, he'd expected every road he'd ever walked to come to light.
People twisting things into strange misunderstandings — that was something he'd already lived through as a child. If it still stung now, that only meant he hadn't steeled himself enough.
He picked up the vitamin drink lying alone on the passenger seat. Then he cracked the lid open and drank every last drop of it.
Not bad.