When Kim Taehyung's fictional romance with his costar Jeon Jeongguk starts to feel more genuine than anything he accomplished in his entire acting career, he believes it shouldn't be a problem: after all, it's just acting.
But isn't it wrong to be...
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Moonhee noticed Taehyung hasn't answered his phone in weeks.
It shouldn't have bothered her this much. They were grown adults, actors, with their own personal lives and priorities. And of course, she couldn't imagine how crazy his schedule was. He was in America, in a different time zone, doing the job she was oh-too familiar with.
But it bothered her. Disturbed her like an itch in the back of her mind she couldn't get rid of, no matter how many plastered smiles she wore to mask her building concern. Not even the shoots she took, filling up a schedule that was originally supposed to be empty, was enough of a distraction.
How could she not think of him? How could she not when his shoes were still scattered in her apartment and his clothes, although washed, were snug in her closet and drawers? It was funny, how a toothbrush, an extra chair, or a pair of keys hung next to hers screamed Taehyung. Funny how she reached out for him in the dark after a long day, yearning for his deep laughter against her jaw, only to be met with nothing.
It wasn't simple. How could she forget about his presence when he was so deeply integrated into her routine, her life? He was responsible for unraveling everything she knew about solitude, reminding her how it felt to be needed.
A phone call shouldn't have mattered but it did. It did matter.
Except—no. Moonhee was better than this. She was twenty-six. Too old to be "yearning." Too old to be standing in the dim light of her empty apartment, wondering how she could get so choked up over the fact her messages remained delivered.
But even so, if she was too old, then why were a dozen butterflies unleashed in her stomach when her phone began to rang? Why did her heart race like a naive teenager, clusmily beating in her chest when she set aside her glass of whiskey (a telltale sign of her age) and picked up her phone to see who was calling this late?
And why, why did her usual, stoic expression soften when she saw that treasured caller ID? A caller ID she told herself to stop hoping for because hope was a dangerous thing. Dangerous how it made her heart incessantly throb for a man that she shouldn't depend on, and yet the butterflies clogged in her gut ignored every warning sign; the feeling was overwhelming, consuming, and naive.
So, so painfully naive.
Moonhee exhaled and leaned back against the cabriole. Back in her perfectly manicured grip was her glass of whiskey. Two, lone cubes of ice drifted within bronze liquid as she brought the phone to her ear, gaze lingering on how they danced around one another, never quite touching, just grazing languidly.
"Hello?" She tossed her head back and took a sip, relinquishing how it seared her throat, opened her eyes to her reality. A reality where pitiful hope wasn't welcomed. Where irrelevant butterflies needed to be crushed because genuine things like that would never last.
"Hey. It's been a while."
And then there was his voice, all resonant and throaty and familiar.
