Night Stroll (2)
The night air was already fairly chilly.
Even though it was late, I still saw the occasional walker or cyclist passing by. Naturally, nobody paid us any attention.
I walked side by side with Jiyu, leaving a little space between us.
The face peeking out from beneath her hood was, as expected, beautiful.
Seeing her like this, I could tell she really did resemble Jin Se-yeon. Now that I thought about it, I seemed to remember Se-yeon once saying that people often mistook them for sisters when they were little.
We walked in silence for a moment before Jiyu spoke first.
"It's really not true."
"Huh? What isn't?"
"That rumor about me dating Juno from Mukids."
"Really? You never contacted him separately or anything?"
"He did message me once, saying he hoped we could just know each other casually..."
"Huh?"
That was basically an invitation to see each other, wasn't it?
Jiyu answered firmly.
"I made it clear so there wouldn't be any misunderstanding."
From what she told me, it seemed Juno really did have a thing for her. He kept showing up wherever Jiyu was, and in the end a photo got snapped and the article went out.
Honestly, dating rumors were as routine as breathing for idols.
Most of them were just rumors, but quite a few were true, too.
After all, when men and women in their prime all gathered in one place—especially the most beautiful and handsome people in the entire country—it was only natural that feelings would start to grow.
No matter how hard their agencies tried to stop it, they always found a way to date in secret. And the people around them usually knew more or less, even if they pretended not to.
For the record, that came from Lee Dong-ho.
"Don’t you date a lot around you?"
"There are a fair number, but... I’m not really interested."
"How come? Isn’t your whole world packed with handsome idols?"
Jiyu shook her head.
"I’m not really into idols. And I don’t look at men’s faces."
"Oh. Uh..."
That was an awkwardly loaded answer.
Jiyu flailed her hands in alarm.
"A-ah, I didn’t mean you’re ugly, senior."
"It’s fine."
It was clear enough that she was a considerate, thoughtful kid who knew how to take other people’s feelings into account.
In fact, Jiyu donated a lot and volunteered hard, too. Idols might earn plenty of money, but money was precious to anyone.
No matter how much you earned, donating was never easy. I knew that better than anyone.
Maybe Jiyu donated even more than I did.
"Anyway, I’ve been so busy lately that I don’t even have time to meet anyone. So you can just assume all those dating rumors are fake. I only came out today because it’s been such a long time. Lately, the second I get home, I’m too exhausted to do anything but sleep."
Hearing that, a question suddenly occurred to me.
"Then wouldn’t it have been better to rest or see your friends?"
"Uh, well..."
I’d told Sena that we had a senior-junior relationship, but what kind of senior and junior met alone by the Han River in the dead of night?
Both in LA and tonight, meeting me one-on-one was a pretty risky thing for Jiyu.
If anyone recognized her, it would cause trouble. So why, then, had she gone out of her way to meet me?
Jiyu and I didn’t really have any connection.
In the first timeline, we had only met once by chance at the drinking party celebrating Jin Se-yeon’s announcer job. After that, we never saw each other again.
The only thing that had changed from the first timeline was that I’d given her some advice that day.
"If you're only doing this because of what happened back then, you don't need to force yourself."
Jiyu puffed out her cheeks slightly.
"Of course I’m grateful to you, senior, but that’s not the only reason."
"Then what is it?"
"This might sound a little strange if I say it out loud, but..."
"It’s fine. Just say it."
After hesitating for a moment, Jiyu looked at me and said,
"You looked so desperate when you said it."
I was taken aback.
"Me?"
"Yes. It felt like you absolutely needed me to do it."
…
Did I?
Now that I thought about it, maybe I had.
"Why did you tell me that back then, senior?"
I liked Jiyu’s voice, and I liked her songs. I listened often, replayed her videos over and over. I’d thought she could fly much higher, and I regretted deeply that her wings had been clipped so early.
So maybe the reason was...
"Because I liked you."
"Huh? Y-you liked me?"
Seeing her jump in alarm, I realized how easy that could sound the wrong way.
"No, not like that. I’d been a fan for a long time."
"Ah, a fan..."
I hadn’t exactly joined a fan club or followed her around to concerts, but I had definitely been Jiyu’s fan.
"I wasn't that famous back then."
I smiled faintly.
I was talking about the first timeline. Thanks to those memories, I’d been able to help her, and I was glad for that.
By the time we’d talked our way along the river, we’d covered quite a distance.
"Should we head back?"
"Yes."
We turned around and walked in the opposite direction. For some reason, my steps felt lighter than before.
Maybe because of the wind, her hood slipped back, revealing her bright blonde hair.
"That blonde suits you."
"Really?"
"Yeah."
"But it’s such a pain to maintain. I have to go to the salon every time to touch up the roots."
Jiyu pulled her hood back up and said,
"I adopted a puppy this time. It’s unbelievably cute."
"Oh?"
"Yes. My mother brought it home from the place she works. Someone had just dumped it there, and honestly, how awful is that?"
"That’s awful."
If you weren’t going to take care of it all the way, you shouldn’t have taken it in at all.
"So I’m going to raise it well."
"That’s sweet of you."
What kind of bastard was leaving nasty comments about such a kind kid?
Well, there was never really a good reason for malicious comments in the first place...
"I even gave it a name."
"What is it?"
"Yomi. Ji-Yomi."
I nearly burst out laughing, but I managed to hold it in.
Abandoned by a bad owner, then taken in by Jiyu instead.
From the puppy’s point of view, wasn’t that basically a total turnaround?
"That’s cute."
"Yes. Super cute. I’ll show you next time you come by."
"Huh? Where?"
Jiyu panicked and waved her hands.
"A-ah, no, I didn’t mean you should come to my house. I meant I’d bring her out."
"I see."
She seemed to have a bit of a clumsy side to her.
Come to think of it, she was even known among fans for being a little ditzy and adorable.
"Speaking of which, I heard you bought a house this time?"
"Ah! How did you know?"
"I think I heard."
I’d heard she’d bought a fancy apartment in Banpo.
The source, of course, was Lee Dong-ho.
"A real estate investment?"
"No. I bought it for my parents. Honestly, they went through so much raising us. My father worked in a factory even when he wasn’t in good health, and my mother did everything from cleaning to restaurant work. She’s done every kind of job there is. So I promised myself that if I ever made a lot of money, I’d buy them a nice house."
Did her parents ever imagine the house would be worth five billion won?
"You’ve made your dream come true."
"Now I just have to work even harder to pay off the loan."
That was a good mindset.
Debt is what gets people moving.
"People around me actually told me not to buy it because it was too expensive, but I wanted my parents to live in a good house, no matter the price."
"No, you bought well."
People had been saying Seoul housing was expensive for ages, but the real surge hadn’t even started yet.
If she bought now, she wouldn’t lose money even if the market later went through a slump.
Come to think of it, maybe I should do a little real estate shopping myself.
A house for my parents to move into later. A house for Se-yeon when she moved out. And so on.
"Huh, hearing that from senior, the man who works at the world’s best private equity firm, is reassuring."
"World’s best, huh."
"Everyone says Continue Capital is the best. It’s in the news all the time, too."
Unlike my brother, she seemed interested in current affairs as well.
"What’s it like working at Continue Capital?"
"Pretty fun."
Best of all, I got to meet people I’d only ever seen on TV before. The only problem was that a lot of them thought of me as their enemy.
Still, it was satisfying to watch companies grow and grow.
"I saw the announcement you made this time. Seven Round was filmed using Loki and Surreal Screen, and they said all of our company’s music videos will be shot with Surreal Screen too."
Hollywood had been the first to adopt Loki and Surreal Screen. South Korea came right after. Thanks to that, Continue Capital now held the key to controlling entertainment companies.
"They said they’d use it for online concerts too. It’s amazing. Things we never could have imagined before are becoming reality."
"Technology always develops faster than people’s perceptions of it."
Ten years ago, who would have imagined that everyone would be carrying smartphones, or that electric cars and hydrogen cars would be driving down the streets?
Especially online, a massive transformation was just beginning now.
"Senior, you met Director Tak Dongsik, didn’t you?"
I was startled.
"How did you know?"
"I was talking with the director, and your name came up all of a sudden. He said he’d met you together with Lee Dong-ho. He said you were alumni from our school and that you knew each other, and he laughed about what a small world it was."
"I see."
I nodded, then froze.
"But why did you meet Tak Dongsik?"
"I’m appearing in Seven Round this time."
Her unexpected answer shocked me.
"What? Seriously?"
Jiyu, in turn, looked flustered by my reaction.
"Y-you didn’t know? They held a production presentation, and there were probably tons of articles about it..."
I’d only paid attention as far as the investment went; after that, I hadn’t looked into it much.
Jiyu’s main job was singing, but she worked hard at acting too.
There were plenty of idols who balanced music and acting, but very few had achieved the kind of success Jiyu had.
So it wasn’t strange at all for her to appear in Seven Round.
And yet I hadn’t thought of it, because in the first timeline she hadn’t appeared.
In the original course of events, after the C-Lab incident, she had only released songs and barely appeared on broadcast programs at all.
"I don’t really watch TV, so I had no idea. What role are you playing?"
"A character named Yeon-hee who helps the protagonist... Sorry, I can’t say more because it’s a spoiler."
"What!"
Jiyu was playing that role?