Call Me Nuna, Mother-in-Law
“I’m sorry….”
Han Yugyeong stood before me with a deeply apologetic expression. She could no longer join me at the music video shoot with Ha Juyun that we had planned to attend together. Something had come up with a contract at Vanguard, the security company where she served as CEO, forcing her to head straight to the office. It was urgent, she said, and couldn’t be postponed.
In a way, this worked out better. It was far preferable to sitting around alone in Korea with nothing to do. The fact that I’d be shooting a music video was pretty ridiculous, though. When I left Japan, I never imagined I’d end up as the male lead in one.
“If something came up, it can’t be helped. I’ll go by myself and do a good job. Besides, your mother is coming to pick me up, so I won’t have to worry about getting there on my own.”
“Okay. If I finish early, I’ll come over.”
“This is my first time doing something like this, so I have no idea when I’ll be done. I’ll keep you updated on the situation.”
In the end, I decided to head to the shoot alone while Han Yugyeong left first for the office. That said, her work suit looked incredibly sexy. I’d have to ask her to wear it for me later.
After she left, I took a shower, got dressed, and prepared to go out. According to Ha Juyun, they would handle all the wardrobe and makeup at the set, so there wasn’t much for me to do.
Soon enough, as the appointed time drew near, my phone rang. It was Ha Juyun.
“Hello, Mother?”
She had a point. If I called Ha Juyun “Mother” in front of others, it would reveal that I was the boyfriend of Han Yugyeong, the daughter of a chaebol family. From a mother’s perspective, she probably hated the idea.
Excuse me? My girlfriend’s mother wants me to call her Nuna? She certainly looked young enough for it to be believable… Still, if she was asking me to, I couldn’t exactly refuse.
“Understood, Nuna.”
She was the one who told me to call her that, yet she sounded way too happy about it.
“Um… when should I head out?”
She kept squealing “Oh my, oh my” and making a fuss, so I finally cut in. At this rate, we were going to be late.
“Got it. I’ll be right down, Nuna.”
She let out another squeal and hung up. I finished getting ready and headed outside. Since I had already showered and prepared earlier, all I needed was my shoes, phone, and wallet.
When I reached the parking lot in front of the apartment, a large black van that practically screamed “celebrity ride” was waiting.
As soon as I approached, the van door slid open and I heard Ha Juyun’s voice. She was sitting inside, patting the seat beside her invitingly.
“Yongtae~ Come here, sit down.”
“Hello, Nuna.”
The moment I sat beside her, a sweet, seductive scent that seemed designed to tempt the senses washed over me. What perfume was that? As expected of a celebrity, it perfectly matched her image. It was genuinely addictive.
“Hello. You really are incredibly handsome, just like Nuna said.”
A rather burly man sat in the driver’s seat. Must be her manager. Given his size, he probably doubled as a bodyguard.
“This is Hwang Yoon-gi, my manager. Say hello.”
“Nice to meet you. I’m Jin Yongtae.”
“Nice to meet you. Please take good care of our Nuna today.”
After the greetings, we set off. Even during the ride, Ha Juyun seemed endlessly curious, peppering me with questions about myself. The first thing she asked was my height.
“Yongtae, you look so tall. How tall are you?”
“Around 187 centimeters, I think.”
“Really? That’s huge!”
Ha Juyun herself was quite tall for a woman at around 171 centimeters. Han Yugyeong was a bit shorter, in the upper 160s.
“Your body is amazing~. What kind of exercise do you do?”
“I practiced martial arts a bit.”
“Oh my, really? Can you flex for me?”
I did as she asked and tensed the muscles in my forearm. Ha Juyun kept exclaiming in delight as she poked at my arm. My body, honed through constant training and exercise, was hard enough to easily repel her prodding fingers.
After that, she asked about my favorite foods, what movie genres I liked, and whether I preferred pouring sauce over sweet and sour pork or dipping it. Before long, we had arrived at the filming location.
The music video director was a bearded man in his forties wearing sunglasses. The moment he saw me, he looked me up and down. There was no malice in it; he simply seemed to be checking out the actor he’d be shooting today.
“Hmm… It’s a little different from the image I had in mind, but the face is good… Yeah, this should work! Nice to meet you.”
“Ah, yes. Please take care of me.”
He offered a handshake, so I awkwardly returned it. I had looked up the idol named Jun from JBS last night—the one who got caught doing drugs. His image was definitely different from mine. He had a delicate, pretty-boy look, while I was tall and built. No wonder the director’s vision had to change.
Afterward, I was dragged to the makeup room, given a full face of makeup, and changed into my costume. The outfit was a slightly outdated school uniform. From the script, it looked like I’d be playing a rural student from the past. Since it was a music video, there weren’t many lines. I mostly just had to steal glances at Ha Juyun as the teacher, then look down shyly like a bashful country high school boy.
“Alright~! Moving this way!”
“Miss Ha Juyun’s makeup is almost done!”
“Standby in three minutes!”
The first set was a classroom. Ha Juyun hadn’t arrived yet since her makeup wasn’t finished. I was called over by the director and received one-on-one coaching. It wasn’t anything difficult. He basically just encouraged me, saying that editing technology had advanced so much that I should just act with confidence.
Hmm. Come to think of it, this felt similar to the forbidden tutor-and-student sex scene I had with Han Yugyeong yesterday. Except this time I was the student, not the teacher.
The difference was that instead of a nerdy virgin engineering student, I was playing a shy virgin high schooler. There wasn’t an explicit virgin setting, but for a story about forbidden love between teacher and student to look beautiful, both roles should feel pure. That’s why I added the virgin concept myself.
“You’re here early?”
“Yeah, I didn’t need much makeup. Just changed clothes.”
“Yongtae is so handsome that there probably wasn’t much to do with makeup~.”
Ha Juyun appeared and asked. As expected, with her makeup done and wearing a cardigan, she looked much more pure and youthful. Not to mention incredibly beautiful.
“How do I look?”
“You’re beautiful, Nuna.”
“Oh my~! This kid…! You sure know how to talk, huh?”
We chatted for a bit before filming began. The current scene was set in a small rural school. In a classroom with barely ten students, a passionate young female teacher wrote on the blackboard with chalk while teaching enthusiastically. A male student who admired her kept stealing glances at her.
Tap! Tap! Tap!
The sound of chalk hitting the blackboard mixed with the rustling of students turning textbook pages. I kept sneaking glances at Ha Juyun. She truly was an actress; the playful woman from earlier had vanished, replaced by the image of a pure, innocent teacher. Our eyes met. She gave a gentle smile, and I quickly looked down, feigning embarrassment.
“Okay, cut! Yongtae, was it? For your first time, you did an excellent job. Just keep doing it like that.”
“Yes, thank you.”
“Hohoho, I scouted him myself~!”
Even too much praise felt awkward… In truth, this scene hadn’t been difficult at all. All I had to do was imagine stealing glances at the beautiful Ha Juyun.
“Now for the next scene…”
Since we were already on the classroom set, it seemed we were filming all the classroom scenes first. Ha Juyun left for another set to shoot her solo scenes, while I filmed scenes of taking notes, resting my chin on my hand in thought, talking with the minor actors playing my friends, and erasing the blackboard that Ha Juyun had written on.
“Alright, classroom scenes are done. Let’s move on to the alley scene!”
The alley scene hadn’t been in the original script. The director had added it on the spot after seeing my build. It was an extremely cliché scene where the protagonist discovers the female lead, Ha Juyun, being harassed and gets into a fight. Fighting was my specialty, so I didn’t mind, but Ha Juyun looked a bit upset. She went over to the director and started arguing fiercely.
“What do you mean, suddenly adding an action scene without any discussion? What if the kid gets hurt?”
“The stunt actors are all veterans, so it’ll be fine.”
Thinking about it, Ha Juyun had a point. Even if I was fine, a beginner actor could easily get injured by a suddenly added action scene.
“Nuna.”
“Yeah? Yongtae, if you don’t want to do it, you don’t have to. I’ll talk to him.”
“I’m fine. I really did practice martial arts like I said earlier, so I’m confident with action scenes too.”
“Really? If Yongtae says he’s okay with it, then let’s do it. Director, let’s start right away~!”
Ha Juyun suddenly shouted at the director to begin filming, as if she had never been angry at all. The director looked at her with a dumbfounded expression at her complete change in attitude, but Ha Juyun was not someone a mere music video director could complain to. She had debuted as a child actress with a long career, and behind her stood the mighty Shinkang Group. Picking a fight with her would only end in his own loss.
“Then we’ll do a quick rehearsal and jump straight into filming.”
Since it was an action scene, there was a rehearsal. I greeted the other actors and practiced the choreography with them. Their eyes were filled with envy and jealousy at the fact that a nobody like me had suddenly become the male lead opposite Ha Juyun in a music video. I felt wronged. It wasn’t like I had asked for the role; her daughter’s mother had begged me to do it.
After rehearsing a couple of times, we began filming.
I walked through the alley, heard Ha Juyun’s scream, and ran toward the source. She was being harassed by two thugs. Since this was a music video rated for ages twelve and up, it only showed them pulling at her clothes and grabbing her arm.
“Stop it!”
I shouted in an angry voice and charged at the thugs. They delivered their lines—“Who the hell are you? You wanna die?”—and threw punches at me. I ducked according to the prearranged choreography, dodged the punch, and pretended to hit one in the face, knocking him down. The remaining thug hesitated, spat out the cliché line “Just you wait,” and dragged his buddy away.
“Are you okay, Teacher?”
“Ehehe, y-yes!”
“Cut! No, Miss Ha Juyun, what was that ‘ehehe’?”
When I said “Are you okay?” her face had completely melted with emotion, as if she had been too immersed in the acting. If anyone saw that, they’d think she had a crush on me.
Fortunately, we only needed to reshoot from the “Are you okay, Teacher?” part onward, so we didn’t have to redo the entire action scene. We filmed a few more takes and wrapped up the alley scene.
Rejected because the short skirt didn't match the teacher role.
Just some unreleased behind-the-scenes shots.