Self Rival • Completed

xxxii. the deeper complications

Aside from the fact that Kongpob was very guilty and regretful of all his decisions in life concerning how he continued to fool Arthit, another reason that he couldn't be fully happy with Arthit was the fact that he's still bitter that Arthit fell and chose his nerdy persona instead of his rather cool and confident real self. 

Mr. Khan had his eyebrows scrunched as he looked from Kongpob's confidently smiling face to the photo of Kong adorably and shyly smiling raised to his face. Earlier, his master asked him to pick which would he rather be with, putting himself in Arthit's shoes. 

He tilted his head and put his finger under his chin, leaning in to take a better look. 

Kongpob sighed and rolled his eyes when a minute passed and Mr. Khan still looked undecided. "You'll just have to pick, Loong. Obviously, I should be your answer. I'm your master, not Kong."

"And because of that, Kong is my answer. At least, Kong is still smiling at me and he looks really cute." Mr. Khan shot Kongpob a wide smile when his master gave him a glare. "Unlike you."

"Yeah, right," Kongpob shook his head. "This is nonsense. In series, the leading girl always picked the bad guy rather than the good guy. They love cool people and sure bad guys are assholes at first but they grow up and they became the loveliest person, just like I did as per Arthit." 

Kongpob squinted his eyes at Kong's photo, the corner of his lips lifting in irritation. The more he stared at it, the more he felt like Kong was mocking him. "People love character development and dynamics but not Arthit, he would rather be with this guy. Nerdy and adorable Kong."

"Well, Arthit's not a girl," Mr. Khan helped rather uselessly. 

"Really? Thank you, Loong. Here I thought he was only flat chested."

Mr. Khan laughed a bit. "Your humor against Kong definitely won. But what I was saying is that's probably why he would rather be with Kong because the guy's cute and he didn't see the appeal with bad guys like you," Mr. Khan's eyebrows scrunched. "Although, I wouldn't call you a bad guy."

Kongpob shrugged. "I'm not this guy as well."

"You are Kong, he's a part of you. The sooner you accept that, the sooner you'll be happy with Arthit."

"No, I'm not Kong. The guy's lame and unsure of himself. Have you seen me, Loong? Do I look unsure to you?"

Mr. Khan sadly smiled. "I have a theory, Kong's you if only your father didn't pressure you to be perfect like this, aren't you weirded out how perfect and natural you act like Kong?"

"Because I'm a great actor? I don't know. I'm a great pretender and a liar who didn't deserve to be happy with Arthit but what can I do? He picked Kong."

"I remember you when you're still young, you were always shy around other kids, always hiding behind me. You were very cute when you're young," Mr. Khan sighed. "But your father always got mad at you for acting like that."

Kongpob remembered that. He would always take a reprimand every single day from his father. His father would always tell him to stop acting shy because how else was he going to present himself and the company if he's not confident? 

He had to take trainings to think better and be confident of himself. Over the years, all the trainings, counselings, and verbal abuse from his father were injected in his head and his body was forced to be confident. 

"I'm starting to think Kong is the real you minus your unique clothing. Kong is someone you wanted to bury so much. And K, he's just your mask around people. K is the effect of your father's strictness," Mr. Khan took Kong's photo from Kongpob's hand and raised it to Kongpob's face level again. "K is the heir set to inherit a big company and Kong is the one who has friends, me, and Arthit. Kong is you. Accept that and be happy while you still have time with Arthit."