Madness for Two 🎬 yungi [▶]

7

Yunho was getting ready to leave the car that had brought him home from the shooting location when he received a call from Yeosang.

Yunho, who just a moment ago had expressed his gratitude with a friendly smile to the agency driver, suddenly changed his expression. Creases appeared on his forehead as he processed each sentence coming from the other end of the line. He could feel his head pulsating.

"Say it again!" He didn't intend to shout, just struggling to comprehend the information that seemed to deceive his ears all day long. As if he hadn't had enough anxiety from his past, today every whisper he heard seemed to carry words like gross, gay, fag, or even hoe. Oh, a new addition to the vocabulary – bitch.

He genuinely didn't want to dwell on it or care about how people viewed him as an alien.

"The agency agrees to let the rumors spread. Mingi and BM agree that you will act as if you're in love without giving a definite answer about your relationship. They say it's to help promote Madness for Two."

"That's Bullshit! Yeosang! You know that!" Yunho didn't care that he was still in the lobby of his apartment, and a few curious onlookers were trying to eavesdrop. Yunho wished he could care, but he was truly exhausted with so many issues that he shouldn't have to face if SONG MINGI hadn't acted STUPID and kissed him last night.

"I know, Yunho." Yeosang's voice was weak, unmistakably filled with regret.

"Then why is no one on my side?" Yunho lowered his voice this time and whispered. "I thought you understood when I talked about my depression when I was fifteen. When the rumors spread. I don't need a new scandal for people to remember how disgusting Hunter Jung is, Yeosang." Yunho spoke softly.

"I'm sorry, Yunho. But—"

Yunho didn't want to hear it anymore. He disconnected the call and turned off his mobile phone. The elevator door chimed.

"Hi, Hunter!" Mrs. Webster, with her outdated raincoat, emerged from the elevator carrying a tray of roasted corn. "Do you want one?"

Yunho tried to smile at his apartment manager for a moment, but his smile failed, and he felt like crying at the sight of those warm corn cobs.

"Oh, Hunter..." Mrs. Webster said, releasing her right hand from supporting the tray of roasted corn. There wasn't much change in her somewhat sad and flat expression. "I think it's not just the London sky that's drizzling tonight." She rubbed Yunho's hair, "this." The old lady wrapped one of the large-sized roasted corns with the tissue she had in the pocket of her raincoat.

"Eat and rest. You deserve it."

Yunho struggled to hold back his tears and smiled at the old lady. He nodded and hurriedly entered the almost closing elevator.

And when the door almost closed, Mrs. Webster shouted at Yunho, "Oh! And you have a visitor in your room!"

And the two aluminum doors closed before Yunho could ask who or why they could enter his room. After passing one floor and still finding no one else in the elevator, he opened the tissue that wrapped the roasted corn. It was a well-known secret that Mrs. Webster loved to cook in her spare time while managing the order of this apartment. And roasted corn was one of her favorite dishes, even when she had to climb to the rooftop of the London apartment in the drizzle.

But no one protested because, as long as the supplies were there, Mrs. Webster would share her cooking with anyone she met on her way to her room. Often she didn't even taste her own cooking because it had been eaten on the way before she arrived. And she remained happy even though Yunho rarely saw the woman genuinely smile. Well, because she continued to do it until now, that means she's happy, right? Who knows.

Yunho sighed as he began to smell the delicious scent of the warm roasted corn. But there was something about his exhaustion that made him feel nauseous. So, when the elevator opened on the next floor, and a young woman with brown skin Yunho had never seen before entered the elevator, Yunho threw an awkward smile that was returned with a small nod and a shy, sweet smile on the exotic woman's face.

"Want one?" Yunho offered, convinced that he couldn't eat it, and he wasn't the type of person who liked to waste something.

"Mrs. Webster's cooking?" The girl asked, accepting the roasted corn from Yunho's hand.

Yunho nodded and could see a slight blush on the exotic woman's cheek. Then, the elevator chimed. "Yes," Yunho said in a hurry. Exiting the elevator and trying not to appear evasive. But the girl's sparkling eyes seemed to leave an impression.

Yunho didn't need another person who he couldn't meet expectations.

He walked as quickly as possible to his room. The only person he told about the spare key under the bonsai rubber plant, which looked pathetic on the right side of the entrance to his apartment, was Yeosang. And he took the time to check, and the spare key was still there. When he searched for the key to his apartment door in his pocket, he reminded himself to water the rubber plant tomorrow morning.

Before entering, he stared at the rubber plant longer than usual. Something about the rubber plant said he would be okay.

One day, when he failed at a casting and refused Yeosang's offer to accompany him for consolation, he passed by a beautiful pet store. He thought about buying a puppy or a kitten. At that time, he lived in another apartment that did not prohibit pets.

The seller at the store was a short, chubby man with ginger hair and a red beard that reached his chest. He offered Yunho various variations of dogs, even showing each dog with a birth certificate as proof of their breed. Then suddenly Yunho became interested in a Shiba Inu. Its light brown fur, okay, maybe not light brown, but it could still be categorized as brown.

Yunho asked the chubby storekeeper to take it out of the cage. Yunho tried to carry it, and for the first two minutes in Yunho's arms, the animal seemed comfortable. But suddenly everything went chaotic. For some reason, the animal wriggled in Yunho's embrace, scratching and biting Yunho in several places when the storekeeper managed to pull the dog away and stop attacking Yunho. It growled and looked at Yunho with such hostility.

Yunho, with some wounds on his body and scars from scratches and bites, returned with empty hands and questions for God. What was wrong with him? Was he only interested in women? What was wrong with that? Women still had many admirers, right? Men still lined up and competed to get them? Why did the universe feel the need to punish him?

He remembered the TV director saying this morning when rejecting him, "Oh, how foolish of me. I'm sorry, but I forgot to mention that this role is for a straight man." And for a few seconds, Yunho didn't understand what the problem was. And everyone in the room laughed as if it were something funny. And even though he had been clearly rejected, he still waited in the audition room to see which actor got the role. He knew the guy who got the role was still related to the producer who produced the TV show.

He was annoyed because if that was the case, why bother with casting and giving hope?

So, after two days of turning off his mobile phone and not answering the bell Yeosang rang at his apartment door, early in the morning, Yunho left the apartment in jogging attire, just walking around his apartment neighborhood. Not running at all because he was tired of running.

But for some reason, he almost bumped into an old lady carrying two small pots of rose bushes. The old lady didn't blame him for that. And after letting Yunho apologize multiple times, she said, "You seem to need a friend, dear." So the old lady invited Yunho into her backyard, taking one of the bonsai trees neatly arranged near the entrance to her house. "Here. You look like a busy person. The rubber plant doesn't need much attention and care," she said and literally made sure Yunho held it tightly. Yunho thanked her and left.

For some reason, the old woman's smile at that moment fixed a lot of things in Yunho's otherwise depressive mind. Also, the phrase that he looked busy, on the one hand, Yunho wanted to burst out laughing sarcastically, but on the other hand, he wanted to believe it.

That he, who at the time could be said to be unemployed because no one wanted to reuse his acting, was not busy at all.

But deep down, he believed that one day he would be busy again. He would return to being someone who chased his dreams no matter what the world thought.