I Need to Get a Grip
I need to get a grip.
Choi Mina hadn't budged an inch under her friend's overzealous sales pitch, but ever since she'd spotted Yoon Jay on the subway, she'd found herself searching his name and digging through his content more and more often — and today, once again, she was wandering the internet communities.
"Ugh, damn it."
What a waste of good eyes.
Truthfully, her fandom for her old idol had cooled the moment blessings started finding him — a marriage, then a baby. A kind of listlessness had crept in after that, and she'd wondered if she was about to quit being a fan for good. But then she'd seen Yoon Jay in person, and now here she was, holed up like something possessed, devouring everything she could find about him. She'd known the face, of course — the man came up everywhere — but she'd never intended to dig this deep…
Since the fandom was bustling, there were plenty of tidy compilation posts, and Mina clicked through them one by one. Photos and moving gifs from when Yoon Jay had worked as a guard for Wings Company. She'd seen some of this back in her N-IX days, but now that he'd quietly seeped into her life, she saw it all differently.
There he was escorting a female celebrity, spotting his little sister's group Flava in the crowd. There was the legendary gif that hordes of fans had claimed for the "surrogate big brother" archetype — the one where he shielded Yoon Dohwa's lower half with his jacket.
Looking at them side by side like this, they really do kind of favor each other.
Apparently people joked that no twins in the world got along that perfectly, so the siblings must be a publicity fabrication — and thus they'd been nicknamed the "Rigged Siblings."
Normally you'd take this stuff with a grain of salt, but once the fan glasses went on, somehow all of it sounded true.
I was honestly startled — he was just standing in the back, glowing all on his own.
And thank you so much for looking after Dohwa T_T
Fansign reviews from the variety show shoot, where he'd guarded the twins, had surfaced as a bonus thread, and they were fascinating too. "Honestly, I was annoyed they were filming, but then I saw his face and forgot all about it. He tucked the fansign merch into our bags so carefully, looked after the kids without once hogging the spotlight — the man has actual sense. And he is stupidly handsome." Reports like that were everywhere.
Whenever dissatisfaction with the security detail flared up, everyone reached for Yoon Jay. And because he'd taken a wound on the back of his hand in place of Yoon Dohwa, he was already something of a hero among Flava fans.
Mina clicked into another post. This one was an anecdote from the fire on the set of Aroong Aroong.
So that's what happened.
Huh. I never watched the drama, so I had no idea. Scrolling down with growing interest, she clicked on a video. When Park Shin-hwa, Yoon Jay's brief scene-stealing turn in Big Company People, blew up bigger than anyone expected, the production team had released an edited behind-the-scenes clip.
"I can do other languages too."
"Wh-what ones can you do?"
"Which would you like?"
The Yoon Jay in the video really was Park Shin-hwa. The clip of him introducing himself fluently in one foreign language after another ran even longer than what had aired.
My friend in my French dorm overheard him and nearly jumped out of her skin — asked me if he was a local
Him saving a kid back in his firefighter days
Fans, by nature, obsessed over the smallest things. Decent foreign-language skills and people wailed about how brilliant he was; a comfortable upbringing and they swooned over the silver-spoon flex. That was exactly why stanning Yoon Jay was so much fun. The thin filmography bothered her a little, but he was so good at his actual craft that the list was bound to grow — and an onion-like past that kept peeling back layer after layer of surprises didn't read as a shady history at all. If anything, it made him more attractive.
And then, in real time, she watched the minor controversy Han Jin-woo had once mentioned unfold. One account had posted a secondhand sighting, baseless speculation had been flung around mindlessly — and a reporter took the bait.
Actors got far more leeway on dating rumors than idols did, but for a fandom still taking in new fans by the truckload and riding its rise, it was a blow. Even Mina's fingers stilled over her phone for a moment. All the celebrities who'd flashed past her in the past came flooding back. Don't tell me I've latched onto the wrong one again?
The fandom's overall stance was to wait for the agency's official position, but with reactions exploding at this volume, the haters trying to tear him down were in an even bigger frenzy. The long-term girlfriend was already being treated as settled fact.
Even after the agency posted its statement calling the reports groundless, the uproar didn't stop — until it was smothered by a video one fan dug up.
Right there, in a compilation of tearful reunions, was Yoon Jay. Talk about a plot twist nobody saw coming.
At a high school graduation ceremony, Serena Jenkins walked up to the stage when her name was called and accepted her diploma. She did look like the woman from the sighting reports. And then, slinking out from behind the stage, sneaking closer so as not to be caught — anyone could tell it was Yoon Jay.
"AAAAH!"
"Hey."
Just as Serena took her diploma and turned to head back to her seat, Yoon Jay appeared. She screamed in shock, then burst into tears, and Yoon Jay pulled his little sister into his arms while the graduating class whooped and applauded. The video, posted to social media by one of Serena's close friends, carried a caption underneath: a little sister reuniting with her big brother after so long.
The articles had vanished sometime in the commotion, and what remained behind was fan fury. Mina's thumbs were flying just as fast — until yet another fresh piece of bait surfaced and brought them to a halt.
"Those bastards lied to me……"
She hadn't clicked in because she wanted to watch Moon Changmin, so she caught herself before pressing the skip button. Because you never knew when or where Yoon Jay might pop up.
The scene of Moon Changmin, fallen to the very bottom, plotting his revenge — a sweeping OST ratcheting up the tension.
"I'll pay them back exactly what I received, won't I?"
"And that is grace!"
And interspersed throughout came Yoon Jay in a pristine white suit — looming over Moon Changmin like a threat, or swinging a baseball bat with preternatural, almost divine grace. For a mere special appearance, his share of the screen was huge; his name value had soared while the drama was in the edit.
"You touched the wrong person."
The screen went dark, and Moon Changmin's weighty line rolled out. Just as the video seemed to end, a short cookie scene followed: a man in a white suit walking toward the camera, unhurried, footsteps ringing. He sat down directly opposite the lens. And then he smiled — slow and wide.
"Hello there."
The face had been deliberately smudged and blurred for later release, but even beneath the distortion, Baek Jin-ri's skin-crawling expression refused to disappear.
The moment the teaser dropped, promotional articles came pouring out, and the whole long-term-girlfriend controversy was buried just like that.
……Yoon Jay is expected to take on the role of Baek Jin-ri, the leader of a sham religion, in Netflix's highly anticipated 2023 series The Garden of Evil, where he will go head-to-head with Moon Changmin in what promises to be an electrifying acting showdown.
Wow. No wonder he gave me the creeps even with that face. Is that what happens when someone acts that well? Giddy, Mina posted and commented and replied until she happened to glance at the clock. She hadn't done a single productive thing — how was it already this late?
……Wait. Did I just fall into this fandom?
She'd realized it far, far too late.
Yoon Jay shot upright, gasping for air, his body still shuddering as if in the grip of a seizure. Was it because of coming face to face with John in the States? Ever since he'd returned to Korea — ever since he'd deliberately cracked his own mask open — this kept happening.
He was trying to force the mask back into place when he heard the elevator chime, followed by the sound of someone stirring outside.
Who is it?
His surroundings had already shifted into something else — no longer the apartment the agency had arranged. He was standing in the middle of an underground bunker that reeked of damp earth. He took stock of himself. His fingernails had all been torn out, his hands caked in blood — but the shackles were off.
Is it that bastard?
Yoon Jay muffling his breath, he ghosted toward the entrance and pressed himself flat against the wall, watching for his opening. The moment the door opened, he seized the intruder's wrist, twisted it to spin the man around, and drove him back into the wall.
THUD!
"AAAAGH!"
It was over in a matter of seconds. Han Jin-woo, his vision flashing white from the shock, shrieked at the pain of his wrenched arm. His face was crushed against the wall, but he rolled his eyes as far back as they would go — and the man pinning him was Yoon Jay.
"Hyung! That hurts!"
"……"
"Hyung! Jay hyung!"
"……Hah!"
One look into Yoon Jay's eyes and Han Jin-woo thought, he could actually kill me right now. At the sound of the commotion, Yoon Jay finally registered where he was — not Syria, but an apartment in Seoul.
"Ugh, agh……"
"Sorry. Did it hurt a lot? Let me see."
"Uh…… I'm okay."
Some part of him had instinctively pulled his strength, because Han Jin-woo looked remarkably intact. At a loss for what else to do, Yoon Jay anxiously inspected his shoulders and arm.
"Wow, hyung. You are crazy strong."
That he wasn't raising a fuss over being blindsided and hurt — just letting it go — somehow made Yoon Jay feel even worse.
"I'm really sorry. Should we get you to a hospital?"
"Aw, come on. Over this?"
Han Jin-woo had, in truth, very nearly wet himself at the look in Yoon Jay's eyes. They'd been brimming with murderous intent — nothing like the Yoon Jay he knew. The man had snapped back to himself quickly and was now floundering in embarrassment, but Jin-woo's heart was still hammering.
"By the way, what did you take me for, a burglar? What kind of burglar punches in the door-lock code and walks right in?"
Truthfully, if Yoon Jay had been even slightly rougher, Han Jin-woo would have ended up in a hospital bed. He'd mistaken him not for a thief but for something else entirely — but for now, he just nodded.
"If it hurts, you have to see a doctor."
"No time, hyung. We've got a flight to catch."
Barely back in Korea, and he was already heading for the airport again. He was scheduled to appear as a presenter at a music awards ceremony in Japan — and the reason actors showed up to present at these things was, of course, the party held afterward. The awards drew a crowd of actors, industry figures, and investors, and Cho Youkyung was hosting. Glad as she was to be seeing him again after so long, she'd offered him a business-class ticket; he'd declined, politely.
"You're really all right, though? Honestly?"
"I told you I'm fine. Look."
Even after they'd had their departure photos taken at the airport and passed into the duty-free zone, Yoon Jay kept glancing at his own arm. Han Jin-woo finally stopped in place and demonstrated, in plain view, that his stretching was perfectly normal.
"Anyway, with you around, security's the last thing anyone needs to worry about."
"I really am sorry."
"If you're sorry, can I ask you one thing?"
Try as he might, Han Jin-woo couldn't reconcile that expression with a man merely catching a burglar.
"This morning — was that reaction partly that trauma you told me about?"
"……Yeah."
"Is the movie going to be okay for you?"
He was reviewing the script for the film Lee Seo-won had marked out for him after Daldongne. As it happened, the role was a soldier, with plenty of fight scenes.
"Hard to say."
"Well, I heard the biggest investor is someone the CEO knows personally. So if it starts going bad mid-shoot, just tell them you're out."
"That'd be far too much of an imposition."
"Capital is king in this industry, hyung. And you do know an investor, don't you?"
Not that well, though.
Either way, Han Jin-woo made a point of reassuring him. He'd always assumed Yoon Jay was simply the effortlessly cool older-brother type; discovering how many things he carried quietly, out of sight, had been a surprise.
"Then I'll have to give it a try."
He was anxious, honestly. Failing to tell reality from a flashback and laying hands on Han Jin-woo of all people was a red flag — he could threaten someone else at any moment. Better to hope for another stroke of coincidence like Daldongne.
He boarded the plane carrying that small knot of unease with him.
"Oppa! Oppa!"
"Yoon Jay-ssi!"
What startled him was how many fans at the K-pop event were waving his slogan banners and calling for him — at an event whose stars were, by definition, the singers. He'd heard Aroong Aroong had done decently in Japan, but he hadn't expected a turnout like this.
He wanted to sign for every single one of them, but there was no time. He crossed the red carpet and headed for the waiting room — where a welcome sight was waiting.
"Hyung!"
"Oppa!"
Flava and Buster, who'd entered earlier, had been holding a spot for him. It wasn't just Yoon Do-jun and Yoon Do-hwa — several of the other members he'd grown close to while filming Manager's Daily Life were there too.
I need to get a grip.
He buried the restlessness deep and smiled.
