A Deal For The Devil | WooSan

40 | No Luxury Business

San had just been about to sit down and eat—his third attempt that day. However apple just millimetres from his mouth and chair on the backs of his knees, a voice interrupted him...

'San Sshi... I'm so sorry...'

Closing his eyes, he felt like he could cry.

Standing back up, he turned to find his mew manager by the door with a sheepish look on his face.

'You've just had a radio and television interview added to your schedule...'

He didn't have to be a fortune teller to know that the interview wasn't in the distant future.

Jaw grating, he swallowed back a string of foul curses, blood absolutely boiling. 'Am I going to get to eat at all today? It's six o'clock,' he glowered, moreso to himself. He hadn't eaten since dinner last night—the whole day unfolding in an unorganised, poorly communicated mess, and he was fucking exhausted.

Practice, recording, more practice, filming, practice again...

His stomach growled painfully, and he stared down at his apple longingly...

'You shouldn't...' his manager warned, though he did not sound happy to have had to say such a thing.

And he knew why he'd said it. His makeup artist had a policy—which, in a way, he understood. No one wanted to be forced to sit in front of someone and be forced to smell their lunch breath while they did their job.

But now...

'I'm fucking starving,' he complained, and it was in the moment that he decided, fuck the rules and took a bite of his apple, he realised, he had discarded his long-term crush on his makeup artist. It hit him with a little bit of a jolt, realising that after so long pining after her, he no longer cared, and in fact, he felt that he loathed the fact that he would have to go and sit in her chair for another hour, when all he wanted to do was eat enough for breakfast, lunch and dinner combined, and then go the fuck to sleep.

Grabbing his bag, he huffed, walking over to his manager.

However while he'd been prepared to yank his apple away from him to keep from it being taken off of him, his eyes widened a little in surprise as the guy—Sejun, roughly his age, maybe seven or so years older—stepped up intensely close to him, put his hands on his hoodie...

And slipped what felt like a sandwich into his pocket.

'We'll buy toothpaste and a brush on the way,' Sejun said, patting him on the shoulder and leading the way, holding the door open for him.

His mouth watered at the thought of the food, and he flashed his manager an appreciative look.

Perhaps the rest of the night wouldn't be so bad...

He couldn't have been more wrong.

~~~

It had turned out Yeosang had been roped into the same television interview—the staff conveniently neglecting to mention is had been a prerecorded game show—and as they sat on a couch surrounded by cameras, tied together around their waists with stupid headbands on, he could feel he wasn't the only one with their patience running thin.

Yeosang fucking hated being manhandled, and hated skinship equally as much, but being forced to pretend it was okay, while he'd become a good actor over the years, his body was tense and riddled discomfort.

He tried not to make it any worse by touching him unnecessarily, but as they were forced to participate in ridiculous games for the camera, it was impossible not to wonder what the fuck they were doing.

Anger was coming over him tenfold, sick to death of being told what to do every two seconds to create the perfectly scripted, unscripted episode, he felt like he was at breaking point.

His stomach was growling—the sandwich long gone, and despair was beginning to set in...

'San Sshi, smile a little more, you look like you're in pain.'

Gritting his jaw, he felt like the biggest push over as he put across an apologetic look and nodded, plastering a smile onto his face, even though suddenly, he felt like he could cry.

'Okay, good. Now you both come over to the twister board again—we need to retake that scene.'

Gritting hie teeth, he and Yeosang struggled to get to their feet and walk back to the ridiculous game, and finding the dots with their names written in tiny pencil over them, he widened his stance and felt the way Yeosang's body tried to reject the notion that he would have to lean entirely into his chest to reach his dots with his feet.

'Good! Okay, now just stay there for a moment while we get the shots—MC's, move to the center.'

Closing his eyes, he felt like he could weep... He was starving and exhausted and tired and angry, and all the pretending was breaking him down...

A shudder tore through his body...

And Yeosang must have felt it, for suddenly, he felt his head of blonde hair scrape over his chest. Blinking his eyes open, he saw him looking up at him... Moments before he put his hand over his microphone pinned to his shirt. 'Are you okay?' he murmured softly.

Swallowing he nodded. However his stomach rumbled, and with it, he nearly whimpered in pain.

Yeosang looked at him with his calculating sleek eyes, reading him...

But he couldn't stand it. 'I'm fine,' he murmured, putting on as best of a confused look as he could.

He could see Yeosang didn't buy what he was selling. But just as he looked like he was about to say something, suddenly, he had his own problems to deal with, when abruptly, the PD called, 'next position,' and he was left with another group of people in his immediate vicinity, far too close for his comfort.

Swallowing back his anger, he braced himself stronger and took more of Yeosang's weight, leaning them further away from the other team to given him some peace of mind.

He felt Yeosang's body tense, incredibly beyond uncomfortable.

And it only made him angrier.

Why must we go through this? he snapped silently, listening to the cameras clicking.

Surely, this isn't what it's supposed to be like.

~~~