The Words I Wanted to Hear (3)
I wasn’t entirely sure why she was sharing such deeply personal stories with me. In a way, these were probably things Arine wanted to keep hidden. That’s why I hadn’t pressed her about them. I sensed there was more beneath the surface, but I had no desire to rip open a wound so raw it could freeze the audio mid-stream. Truth be told, I had never once heard why she quit being an idol trainee. If she had ever mentioned it on air, the clip would have exploded across the internet and I would have caught at least some version of the story. The fact that I hadn’t meant she had never spoken about it publicly.
Streamers end up talking about everything eventually. I had even shared the story of breaking up with my ex-girlfriend. It was only natural. Unlike other jobs, streamers couldn’t treat their audience as mere customers. You spent all day laughing, crying, and communicating together in the same space. In a sense, they became friends, lovers, and family. Just as I felt an indescribable intimacy with the viewers in my own room, it would be a lie to say Arine felt nothing of the sort. Before they were streamers, they were people, and most people eventually open up when they’re with someone they feel comfortable around.
Yet Arine had hidden her past until the very end. That alone told me it was something she wanted to keep buried. And yet she had chosen to tell me. Whether she had done it to explain the situation or because she genuinely trusted me as a person, I couldn’t be sure. But since she had gone this far, I knew I had to answer her with complete sincerity. I felt it was my responsibility.
“Arine.”
[...Yeah. Oppa.]
“Do you remember what you said to me right before the stream started today?”
[This evening? What did I say again?]
“You told me that even if it was only the view count, the watch time had been high too. That meant the video was actually fun, right? And you thanked me.”
[...Yeah.]
“I agree with you. That’s why I didn’t argue at all.”
That was it. The view count might have been thanks to Arine, but watch time couldn’t be forced. It was something only genuine entertainment could guarantee. And those words overlapped with Arine’s current situation in more ways than one.
“You’re right. Internet broadcasting is exactly the same. A pretty face might win people over at first, but that’s all it can do. Keeping that goodwill is a matter of skill. The reason people stay by your side is because you’re giving them something beyond your appearance. Isn’t that true?”
Anyone who has streamed for even a little while knows this. Actually, it isn’t limited to broadcasting. Even if a celebrity opens a restaurant on the strength of their name, the initial rush might come from fame, but if the food is bad, customers will slowly disappear and the place will fail. Of course, the promotional value of a famous name isn’t meaningless. Promotion matters in business. But what matters more is skill—the actual taste of the food. A restaurant can succeed without a celebrity owner if the food is excellent. That is the essence of the industry.
The same principle applies to streaming. If a female streamer’s looks are like a celebrity’s fame, then Arine’s charm and skill are the flavor of the dish. And after three years, Arine’s “new streamer” boost had long since ended. The people still beside her weren’t there for her appearance. They were held by her talent.
[......Is that so?]
Her voice still carried a trace of anxiety. I hadn’t expected a few words from me to heal years of built-up trauma. It might not even feel like comfort. Still, that was fine. This was simply the courtesy I owed her. A repayment for the sincerity she had shown by revealing such deep scars to someone she couldn’t even call close.
“I’m not just saying nice things to make you feel better, and I’m not sugarcoating anything. This is the truth.”
So I spoke even more firmly. Believe in yourself. You’re genuinely good at this.
“Your reaction skills, the way you make people open up comfortably, your ability to plan content. The way you always put viewers first and tailor your streams to their needs. I’ve been quietly amazed more times than I can count while watching you. That was the difference between us, and realizing it made me feel pathetic for still being a hako.”
Even the way she had planned our virtual marriage was different. Arine knew that the more annoying and difficult something was for her, the happier it made the viewers, so she was the kind of person who would pull off something as insane as building up a virtual marriage while carefully considering their emotions. At least, I had never seen another streamer who thought about their audience as deeply as she did.
“You deserve your popularity. I didn’t deserve mine, so I never had it. And if looks were really that important, would you have collabed with someone like me? The viewers are the same as you. Think about it. The reason you found me fun and interesting, the reason we ended up in a virtual marriage—was it because of my face?”
[......No. Yeah.]
She answered so quickly? That actually stung a little. Still, sensing that she was slowly being convinced, I grew more passionate.
“Exactly. So trust yourself a little more. Trust in all the time and effort you’ve poured in. Trust in your skill. You already know that the opinions of people who have never even streamed don’t matter much.”
[......]
“Of course the memories from your past won’t disappear overnight. But at least you’re past the stage where you need to doubt yourself with thoughts like, ‘If it’s not my appearance, I’m nothing.’ You already are so much more.”
I stopped there. I had said everything I wanted to say. Anything more would just turn into nagging. She was a professional streamer and a grown adult who could think for herself. It was time to leave the rest to her—
[Hic.]
Wait. That sound was strange.
[Huuup… huuuk…]
Sniffling. The soft sound of skin brushing against skin. It wasn’t the sound of rubbing, but of wiping away something that kept falling.
[Huuuuk. Huuu… Huuuung.]
She had tried to hold it back, but the dam finally broke. Her trembling voice rang out beautifully through the speaker. For a moment I was struck by how even her crying voice was pretty.
[Th… thank you… hic… Oppa… for saying that… huup… ugh… thank you… really…]
I could picture it without even seeing. Sitting in front of her monitor, constantly wiping away the tears that kept flowing with the back of her hand, eyes slightly red, sniffling as she thanked me over and over. It was so pitiful and, at the same time, unbearably cute.
[No one… no one has ever said that to me… hic… not once… not even once… huuuk.]
What an idiot. There was no way no one had ever said those things to her. She had simply been trapped inside her own world and couldn’t accept their words as sincere. Because to her, those people existed beyond the internet.
“What are you crying about over something like this, you dummy?”
[But… huuuk… it’s too… huuuu… but….]
She had even lost the ability to form proper sentences. Yet I found myself smiling warmly. Maybe these were words she had desperately needed to hear.
“It’s probably what your fans have been telling you every single day.”
So I had simply delivered the sincerity they had thrown at her countless times—sincerity that had never quite reached her. That was how I saw it.
She cried her eyes out. Like a five-year-old child who had collapsed on the sidewalk, she sat in front of her monitor and wept without end. Only when she was so exhausted that no more tears would come did Arine finally regain her senses. She apologized to Doyun repeatedly before ending the call.
“Ugh… this is so embarrassing… what the hell was I doing… by myself…”
Too drained to even wash up, she slid helplessly into bed. Staring blankly into the dark ceiling, shame flooded over her. What must Doyun think of her now? Some crazy woman who suddenly spilled her entire painful past and then bawled her eyes out after a few kind words.
“......Ugh. He probably lost all interest in me, didn’t he?”
What if he thought she was a total mess? If she had been in his position, she would have lost interest too. It was her own story, so she understood the emotions, but there was no way Doyun could follow that turbulent flow. He must have been completely flustered. Definitely. The fact that he hadn’t shown even a hint of displeasure and had patiently accepted all her whining made him seem like a saint.
She had called to apologize for what happened today, yet she had only given him more things to forgive.
“Sigh… why did I even bring all that up? You idiot?”
When emotion had overtaken her, sharing her story had felt okay. But now that the tears had stopped and her head was clear, she regretted it. It wasn’t the kind of thing she should have dumped on him. No matter how she looked at it, they hadn’t known each other that long. She had unloaded stories that would have been burdensome even to her own family.
There was no bigger fool than her.
Still. Even so, Arine felt good. Letting out the festering story she had never been able to tell anyone had helped. But apart from that—
The words he had said to her were so warm. They were exactly the words she had wanted to hear more than anything, and her chest felt full and fuzzy. She kept letting out helpless little laughs. She wanted to hear those same lines in his voice one more time.
......She didn’t know if she should believe them completely. She just wanted to. Even if they were only sweet lies meant to comfort her, she wanted to believe him.
“...Seriously. He really feels like a completely different person at times like this.”
The Doyun he had shown her today was so serious and gentle. It was so different from his usual lighthearted self that he seemed like another person entirely. She was feeling again what she had felt during the virtual marriage announcement event.
Just as her first impression of him had suggested, Doyun wasn’t merely a fun person. He was far more complex, a fascinating man like an onion—every layer she peeled back revealed something new.
“Is this what they call gap moe?”
He really was attractive in so many ways. Arine smiled softly, once again convinced by the intuition she had felt from the very beginning.