The Best Version of Me
The music started the moment the director gave the signal.
Before my mind could catch up, my body was already moving.
As the moves I'd rehearsed countless times flowed into one another like water, the music seemed to swell louder and louder in my ears—an illusion, maybe, but it felt real.
Boom-boom—
The beat slammed into my chest and the excitement rose on its own.
The instant I kicked out hard and hung for a breath in midair, the corner of my mouth curled up without my permission.
I could see the camera's black lens tracking me.
I stared straight into it and flashed a grin.
'This is fun.'
After spinning once in place, I began riding the beat with easy, practiced swagger, alternating a shrug of the shoulder and a tilt of the head without ever letting my gaze slip off the lens.
Through a lens no bigger than the palm of my hand, I could see all the people watching me on the other side.
For a moment, a jolt ran through my whole body.
'Wow. This is insane.'
Fun. It was so fun I thought I might lose my mind.
Everyone's eyes converging on me, music that fit my taste perfectly—down to the asphalt sizzling under the blazing sun, everything was electrifying.
I was even proud of the way my body moved and bent exactly as I willed it.
Yes—this is what I've been running toward all along!
"Keep your eyes on me."
Before I knew it, I was humming along with the lyrics slicing through the beat. I didn't spare a thought for the sweat trickling down my jaw from the intense choreography. I kept smiling the whole way through the side-step, riding that snap of my ankle.
Instrument layered over instrument as the music climbed to its peak, and my body sped up with it. Then every sound vanished at once—and I stopped with it.
My hands, my feet, my head, my hips. Everything stood precisely where I had intended it to be.
"……Haah."
I let out a long breath. What escaped me wasn't a sigh—it was satisfaction.
"Cut!"
Jolt—
My body flinched at the man's voice booming across the set. I blinked rapidly, and the moment some of my senses came back, I sank straight down to the ground.
"Are you okay?!"
Someone came sprinting from far away, shouting. Who else would it be? There was only one person here who'd act like that.
I was in no state to answer, so I just waved a hand vaguely to say I was fine.
I wasn't out of breath, but strangely, I felt dizzy. My heart pounding like it was about to burst felt like it belonged to someone else.
"Whew. Hyung, I—"
"Yes. Right here."
Before I could even finish, Manager Ahn Jinbae was handing me water. The staff who'd run over with him opened umbrellas above me and dabbed the sweat from my forehead.
Even as I thought, what am I, royalty?, I realized it had been a long time since I'd grown used to letting other people take care of my body. I accepted people fussing over my hair without any discomfort as I checked the footage.
On the camera screen was a boy utterly absorbed in his dancing.
"……I'd heard about it, but you really can act."
I was still checking whether I'd flubbed any choreography when a low voice came from beside me. It was the camera director.
"Thank you."
"No—thank you. I've spent so long shooting kids who only know how to pose pretty and look cool, do you have any idea how long it's been since I caught an actor who actually acts on my camera? You wouldn't."
Satisfaction shown plain and bright through his smiling face. His stubbled face gave him a wild, rugged look, but he was grinning so widely he could have passed for a boy.
His eyes reminded me of Noh Bihyeok's. The eyes of someone who loves what they do.
"I'm glad you were satisfied."
"Satisfied? This is beyond that. Now I get why they said one-take. You just focus on the performing—we'll handle the editing as much as we can. Ah, but there's that move where you kick at the camera, right? Just to be safe, I think we should shoot that part separately too… Would that be all right?"
"Of course."
He'd abruptly switched to casual speech, but his manner was actually more careful than when he'd been speaking formally. The expressions on Team Leader Choi and the men in suits didn't look bad either. What a relief.
We filmed a few more takes, and then I headed to the waiting room to change clothes.
While a staff member was helping me swap into a different colorway of the sneakers, she suddenly gasped.
"Are you hurt? Your foot…"
"Sorry?"
"Oh my—maknae! Bring the first-aid kit!"
I looked down at my scraped-up foot the way you'd look at someone else's. No wonder it had been stinging.
Apparently dancing that hard in an unworn pair of sneakers did this.
'Or maybe these shoes just aren't very good?'
My expression froze for a second. What would I do if that were the case? What if my fans… bought them because of me and hurt their feet…
Worry ballooning by the second, I lost track of the noise around me. Manager Ahn Jinbae quietly sent the staff out, then knelt down in front of me.
"Actor-nim. It hurts a lot, doesn't it."
"Hyung."
"Yes. Should we go to the hospital right away?"
"Isn't the material of these sneakers just not broken in yet? What are the odds of getting wounds like this during everyday life?"
"…?"
I'd asked in a low voice, worried an insider might overhear, and gotten back a look of pure incomprehension. As I added an explanation, Noh Bihyeok—who had been sitting so quietly I'd half forgotten he was there—suddenly smacked my arm.
"Hey. Your foot is in this state and that's what you're worried about?"
"…? Why are you mad?"
"Because—haah, forget it. You don't need to worry about that. No matter how good the sneakers are, if you dance like that before they're broken in, of course you'll get hurt."
Noh Bihyeok huffed, looking frustrated. I wondered what his deal was, but Manager Ahn Jinbae carefully explained that Bihyeok was right and that worry was unnecessary, so I relaxed.
"You still have three more takes to film…"
"Bandages will do it."
Thankfully there were plenty. I considered wrapping gauze around to keep the bandages from peeling off, but it seemed like it would interfere with the dancing, so I just layered the bandages on thick instead.
And so the shoot went on—and with every cut, everyone's expressions grew brighter.
The footage looked great, too. Maybe it was the blue sky, but I didn't look all that hot in it. Slightly unfair, that. Still, the sneakers' fresh, crisp colors came through vividly, which was pretty satisfying.
"Ugh."
Taking a short break before the final take, I sat down in a chair and a groan slipped out of me before I knew it.
A low voice I'd almost miss the absence of was there right on cue.
"It hurts a lot, doesn't it…"
"Not bad enough that I can't stand it. Can I take one more painkiller?"
"Yes… Here, drink it with water."
Distress was smeared thick across Manager Ahn Jinbae's face.
"I should have checked beforehand… This was my oversight, born of inexperience. I'm sorry, Actor-nim."
"Hyung, if you're going to say stuff like that, just buy me a tteok-cake instead."
"…! Of course! I'll go right now—"
"Where are you going. Sit. Please."
Seriously, I can't even joke around with this man.
Still, it wrung a silly little laugh out of me. I closed my dry eyes, opened them again, and let my body go slack. The air conditioning on my face felt cool.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
'I wonder what he's thinking about.'
Lee Yeonjae was letting the air conditioning wash over his exhausted face.
Noh Bihyeok was curious what thoughts lived behind that placid expression, but he didn't want to pester the kid when he was already worn out. He was crouching himself smaller into a corner to stay out of the way when the eyes holding those black irises blinked, then turned toward him.
"You okay?"
"…? Are you talking to me?"
"Yeah. You. Waiting around isn't tiring?"
"……Who exactly are you worried about right now. The person who danced all day under the blazing sun?"
If you say it that flatly, with the bite all drained out of it, it just makes me feel guilty for no reason, you know?
When Noh Bihyeok clicked his tongue in reply, the hedgehog laughed, unbothered.
"Sitting still gets tiring too if you do it long enough. You can go home if you want. If it's because of me—"
"Shh. Quiet. Don't finish that sentence."
"What—"
"Nuh-uh. Eyes closed in three seconds. Execute."
A deflated laugh came back at the playful jab. He really was exhausted, then. The guy who almost never showed when he was struggling looked thoroughly spent.
'So standing in front of a camera really isn't easy after all.'
Seeing someone who normally wouldn't care whether a camera was on him or not drooping like this made it sink in all over again.
To be honest, during the pre-shoot rehearsal—the dancing for the camera blocking—he'd just been funny. Lee Yeonjae doing popping with that deadpan expression on his face.
'Oh. Better than I thought…'
'Was he a dancer or something?'
Noh Bihyeok stared hard at Lee Yeonjae while staff murmured around them. His face was perfectly composed as he danced, but his ears were red enough to burst at any moment. The instant Noh Bihyeok noticed, he ducked his head fast and bit his lip. God, too funny.
'The dancing's good, but the expression… really leaves something to be desired.'
'Let's just do one take however he wants first. Then if it doesn't work, we gently talk him down. It's not like he'll argue.'
The conversation between the director and the staff—like they were watching something that didn't measure up—grated on him quite a bit, but he had something he was counting on, so he let it go.
That's right. Noh Bihyeok was at maximum anticipation.
'What will it be like—Lee Yeonjae playing me?'
The Yellow Hat from Tail. Yuhyeon from Zelkova. Kim Suho from Mission Clear. Kim Hoyun from Goodbye, My Summer.
Except for the movie they'd shot months back, he'd watched every single scene Lee Yeonjae had ever acted in. But this was the first time he was seeing it live, right in front of him—and the person being portrayed was him!
'Well… I guess it'll just feel like the expression changes, right?'
Even just now, the only lacking thing had been the expression. He'd probably take his own expression and paste it on there.
That thought disappointed him a little—and yet, somehow, felt like a quiet relief too. If a friend of his mimicked him too perfectly, he figured it would give him chills.
'All right, everyone, quiet please! We're starting the shoot!'
He'd been wandering through stray thoughts when a staff member's shout made him lift his head in a hurry. And then his eyes met Lee Yeonjae's directly. The same black eyes as always.
Noh Bihyeok met those eyes like he was spellbound.
'Ready, action!'
And then the director called it.
Two seconds at most? No matter how long it lasted, it was clearly measured in seconds. It was only the briefest sliver of time. And yet.
Someone else was standing there.
'That…'
Noh Bihyeok was confused. It was definitely Lee Yeonjae. Not a single thing about him had changed.
And yet it felt like a completely different person—and the image that came to mind was one he knew intimately.
'……It's me.'
Lee Yeonjae wasn't copying Noh Bihyeok's expression. He was, in the truest sense, acting.
If I wore Lee Yeonjae's skin and danced, wouldn't this be exactly how I'd carry myself?
Watching someone portray him right before his eyes was an exceedingly strange feeling. But that feeling didn't last long either.
Because he caught it—the subtle shift in Lee Yeonjae's dance line. It had felt far smoother before; now it was more powerful. Especially the sharp rebound driving up from thighs braced hard against the floor. That dance line was unmistakably his own.
'No wonder everyone calls him a genius.'
Understanding something in your head and feeling it in your body were worlds apart.
Goosebumps raced over his whole body—and yet at the same time, another thought left him staring blankly.
'So he… thinks that's what I am?'
The eyebrows angling with easy confidence, the eyes crinkling into a smile—all of it closely resembled him, but it didn't feel like the complete him. And that wasn't simply a matter of different features.
The version of himself Lee Yeonjae was playing looked remarkably lively and upbeat. A pretty decent person—stripped of all the small disappointments Noh Bihyeok sometimes felt in himself, the flaws that sometimes drove him half-mad wanting to erase.
'……So that's how you see me.'
It was like looking at a finished piece assembled from only his best parts, arranged to be pleasing to the eye—and his fingers twitched.
It was a truly strange feeling.