The flowerbed - Aespa's Giselle x M!Reader

The manager that cares (Part 2)

The door to Jung's office hit the wall with a bang as I entered, past the point of professional courtesy. He stood behind his temporary desk, that same smug smile I'd grown to hate playing at his lips while he stirred his whisky with deliberate slowness.

"Ah, our passionate young manager," he said, voice dripping with condescension. "Please, close the door. We wouldn't want to make a scene."

"What the fuck did you do?" My voice was low, controlled, but shaking with rage. "The submission was perfect. I checked every requirement myself."

Jung adjusted his cufflinks, taking a long sip from his glass. "Did you? Because I found several... irregularities. Technical violations. Nothing major, just enough to invalidate the nomination. Shame, really. The girls must be devastated."

"Cut the bullshit." I slammed both hands on his desk, scattering papers and making his whisky slosh. "This isn't about technical violations. This is about you being wrong about Whiplash, about you losing control, about your pathetic need to prove you're still relevant in an industry that's moved past dinosaurs like you."

His smile faltered, just slightly. "Watch yourself. You seem to have forgotten your place lately. Getting comfortable with the talent, staying overnight at the dorm..." He picked up a folder, making a show of reading from it. "Last night, for instance. And this morning. Quite unprofessional, wouldn't you say?"

"That's what this is really about, isn't it?" I laughed bitterly. "You can't stand that we succeeded despite you, that we created something beautiful while you sat in your office drinking yourself into irrelevance and plotting ways to tear it down. You're nothing but a sad, bitter old man desperately clinging to power that's slipping through your fingers."

"Mind your tone-" Jung started, but I cut him off.

"No, you fucking mind yours. Those 'technical violations' you fabricated? They're as hollow as your entire career. You haven't produced a hit in what, five years? Six? Too busy playing office politics to remember what actual music sounds like?"

Jung's face reddened. "I AM EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THIS COMPANY!" He slammed his glass down, whisky spilling across expensive papers.

"And what a fucking joke that is!" I shot back. "You're a has-been who peaked in the second generation and can't handle that the industry evolved. You're so threatened by actual talent that you'd rather destroy careers than admit you're obsolete!"

"You insolent little-" Jung started forward, but I stood my ground.

"What? Going to hit me? Add assault to your list of failures? You're a disposable relic who got lucky with other people's talent. You think your little power plays mean anything? You think anyone in this building respects you anymore?"

"ENOUGH!" Jung's composure shattered completely. "You are NOTHING! A nobody manager who thinks he knows how to produce music? You got lucky with one song. You think that gives you any real power here?"

"They're not YOUR artists," I snarled. "They never were. And they're worth a thousand of you. The only reason you're still here is because the company's too polite to put you out to pasture where you belong!"

"I OWN them," Jung spat, face purple with rage. "Their careers, their futures, everything they've worked for – I can destroy it all with one phone call. And you? You're nothing but a fraudulent little boy playing at being important. A pathetic manager who thought he knows better? You don't know anything. You fucked everything up for me! You thought you would climb your way up? You will always, be an ant to me, prime for squishing."

I moved before I could think, grabbing his collar across the desk. "Don't you DARE talk about them like that, you washed-up piece of-"

"That's quite enough."