Chapter 109: Familiar Face

Looking down from above, a familiar face caught my eye.

Oh! That person!

And at the sight of a welcoming face I hadn’t seen in a while, my face lit up without me realizing it, and my hand went up.

It’s been so long since I’ve seen that face.

Who would’ve thought I’d run into them here!

Nice to see you!

She was holding a camera and had her face slightly covered with a mask, but I could clearly recognize her face.

“Do you know someone?”

When I greeted her so enthusiastically, Hayoon followed my gaze and asked.

“Huh? Over there! A fan.”

“A fan?”

“Ahaha, there’s someone who looks like a fan waving, so I got excited and waved back without thinking.”

“Ah~ Then wave even more.”

Hayoon encouraged me to do even more fan service, and in the brief moment I looked away, she had disappeared somewhere.

A fan of my owner… Why is she here?

She was a fan of my owner.

She’d been with him since his debut, following him to almost every official schedule, and she was such an enthusiastic supporter that even the manager knew her name and face.

To run into her in a place like this…

She was a fan who really liked my owner and had been kind to me too, so I wanted to at least greet her and ask how she’d been, but I regretted not being able to.

“Whoa? Be careful.”

As we went down the escalator toward the departure hall, a few people were following me with their phone cameras raised.

“It’s dangerous… There’ll be time to take photos later before we board. Watch where you’re going.”

“It’s fine~”

“I’m okay!”

“Well, I’m not okay…”

I told them to take photos later, but they didn’t lower their phones until the end.

“Hyunjae, are you feeling alright?”

“Ah~ I was fine from the start, but I don’t know why the article came out like that. I’m really okay, so don’t worry.”

“Don’t get sick~”

“Of course not. With all of you worrying like this, I have to stay healthy.”

From this incident, I properly realized that if I got sick, it would cause a lot of trouble here and there.

“When does filming for Love Some end?”

“Not much left now~ The drama is really fun, so please watch it when it airs!”

I didn’t miss the chance to promote the drama in between, and we entered the departure hall and boarded the plane.

“This is it.”

“Yes!”

Since it was an awards ceremony hosted by a media company, they booked all the seats for celebrities and managers in business class.

“Hyunjae~”

“Huh? Hyung?”

Jibin poked his head out from the seat in front and greeted me.

“You’re going today too?”

“Where were you?”

“I didn’t see you either. With so many celebrities, it’s hard to find anyone.”

In this business section alone, it was half celebrities and half regular people.

“See you later~”

With people around and the quiet atmosphere, we decided to chat later and I sat down, closing my eyes for a moment.

“Hyunjae, we’ve arrived.”

“Mmm~ Yeees…!”

Not long after, Hayoon shook me awake, and we arrived in Thailand, where the KAA was being held.

***

“Wow~ Today was total hell! Reporters, photographers, hommas… And even regular people all mixed in, I thought I was gonna die.”

“On days like today, it’s way better to just zoom in from far away.”

Heeyeon had come to Thailand to do proxy photography work, and upon arriving at the hotel with her dongsaeng, they checked the photos they’d taken.

“Unnie, this one turned out really well, right?”

“I’ll get a good price for it?”

“Yes!”

She took previews of the decent photos and sent them to the hommas who had requested proxy photography.

“Unnie, everything sold out again this time, right?”

“Yeah.”

Heeyeon hadn’t been active for long, but she’d quickly gained a reputation as a golden hand and was making a name for herself in proxy photography.

“I’m so jealous. When will I ever sell out everything…”

“You sold out almost everything except a few.”

“Ey~ That’s only because you sold out early, so they came to me.”

At her dongsaeng’s words, she smiled and continued flipping through the photos.

“But unnie, whose fan are you?”

“Hm?”

“The route for female photographers is 100% stanning… But you don’t seem to have a favorite celebrity.”

To the innocent question, Heeyeon just smiled.

“Who is it? NS? BVS? Or… A-Teen?”

She listed the names of famous male idols who were once so popular that if you didn’t like them, you’d be called a spy.

“None of them.”

“Ah~ Or maybe you discovered your talent while photographing to promote a small idol group?”

“Not that either.”

“What then? Who were you a fan of?”

Heeyeon couldn’t answer her dongsaeng’s question.

Jung Jaehyun.

If she said those three syllables, most people would react with pity or tell her she’d stepped in shit and curse.

“It’s a secret.”

Heeyeon, who had followed him since his debut, knew.

He was absolutely not the type to do something like that.

“Ah~ Why~ I’m curious~”

“No idea. Who are you following tomorrow?”

During performances, each team had assigned members, but for the waiting area during the awards, only one person from the whole group was assigned.

“I’m following Taewoon! And a homma is switching or something, said they’re going to snipe a big rookie, so they entrusted it to me.”

“Hm?”

“Yeah, what about you, unnie?”

“TwoX’s Seunghoon.”

“Mmm~ That one’s visuals are decent.”

“I hope he sits in front.”

If he sat in the back, it was usually hard to get good shots because of the other celebrities sitting in front.

“They won’t line up all the actors in front just to cater to them, right?”

Sometimes they neglected the singers while being busy catering to actors, so she was a bit worried.

“M company’s events are like that, but KAA isn’t. I came last year too, and the actors didn’t sit for long; they came and went.”

“Really? That’s a relief then.”

“Ah~ I need to take legendary photos tomorrow and rake in the cash.”

They were planning to sell the data and make a solid profit.

“If you want to take legendary photos tomorrow, at least memorize a few choreography moves.”

“I’m already an expert. As long as they don’t do some special stage just because it’s an awards show…”

“Has the cue sheet come out yet?”

“Probably tomorrow morning?”

“Okay.”

The two resolved to snag legendary photos the next day.

The next day, the two entered the venue early.

“Wow~ The view is amazing. This seat is jackpot, right?”

They’d paid a premium for the seats, and they were quite close to the waiting area in the front row.

“It’s closer than I thought, so I’ll have to adjust well.”

“You can even see their mouth shapes clearly? Perfect for straight cams.”

“Not bad.”

At these awards shows, it was fun not just for the stages but for seeing celebrities fooling around in the waiting area.

“The front row is all cannons.”

Of course, there were proxy photographers like them, as well as a bunch of hommas from each idol group positioned there.

“Well, it’s not like it’s the first time. Just be careful not to get pushed in the middle. Foreign kids just barge in.”

“They can’t beat me. How many plates of tteokbokki have I eaten?”

“Haha, yeah. Then until it starts… Still a while left.”

“We gotta johnber.”

As the first to enter, they had to wait a long time until the awards started, and after the boring wait, the celebrities entered the waiting area.

“JL’s outfits today are gorgeous, right? Oh! Shin Eunah!”

“Wow~ Actors are definitely different. She’s really pretty.”

Her dongsaeng admired the actress who had recently filmed a high-teen historical drama.

“These days, idols are all pretty like actors too; it’s all about how you style.”

“I still… Oh! It’s Taewoon!”

As soon as her target for today, Taewoon, appeared, her dongsaeng raised her camera right away.

“Next to him is…”

“Park Jibin.”

“Ah! Right! Park Jibin! Probably came together because the response to Today’s Fruit Shop was good.”

Taewoon sat with Jibin, and the camera captured the two of them.

“I like Jung Hyunjae the most out of them… Lately, I think he’s the most handsome.”

“He is handsome.”

Heeyeon agreed with her words while lifting her camera to photograph JL.

“Right? He came out barefaced on Country Three Meals, and he was totally hot. I fell for him watching that. The kid’s cute too.”

“I think Jung Hyunjae is coming today?”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I saw him at the airport yesterday.”

While waiting to take departure photos of the idol she had to photograph, she’d seen Hyunjae heading to board the plane from afar.

“Whoa! I’m really looking forward to seeing him in person; please don’t let it be camera magic…”

“It’s not camera magic.”

“Really?”

“I saw him from far away, but he was handsome.”

She hadn’t intended to look, but he was tall with a small face, so even from afar, he had that celebrity aura.

And above all, the way he smiled brightly at the fans following him stuck clearly in her memory.

“Mmm~ I’m excited!”

“But why isn’t TwoX coming out?”

The performers came out one by one, filling the empty seats in the waiting area, and now there were hardly any seats left.

“Over there, those six seats are empty, right?”

“Ah… Why’d they give them seats like that.”

Second row, side.

It wasn’t a great spot for taking photos.

“It’ll be a pain to edit out the people in front.”

Heeyeon already felt annoyed thinking about nukki-ing out the people in front.

“Even was bigger than TwoX this time. Honestly, this year Even ate it all up.”

The Even she mentioned had already taken the first row and was busy doing fan service to the fans in front.

“Sigh, at least it’s a relief they’re not completely blocked… I hope it’s short actresses in front.”

There were chairs for about three or four people empty in front of where TwoX was sitting, and soon after, the owners of those seats appeared.

“Oh! It’s Jung Hyunjae!”

“Wow~ He’s handsome.”

“Whoa, who is that? How can someone look like that?”

At Hyunjae’s entrance, the people in front all turned to look at him at once, and the venue buzzed a little.

“Wow, shit, it feels like my eyes are being blessed.”

Her dongsaeng, who had been anticipating Hyunjae, turned her camera, which had been on Taewoon, toward Hyunjae as soon as he entered.

He is handsome.

Her eyes had been raised high because of Jaehyun, so while going around taking photos, she hadn’t thought anyone was handsome, but she acknowledged Hyunjae.

“It’ll overlap with Seunghoon’s shots. Unnie, if he gets in, don’t delete; give it to me. I wanna keep some for personal reasons.”

“Got it.”

He was handsome, but for Heeyeon, the reason for taking photos was purely money, so there was no need to photograph Hyunjae specifically.

“They’re moving seats toward Taewoon. Yes! Yeah, they were in the same drama; no way they’d separate them.”

Perfectly timed, Taewoon and Jibin moved to the seats next to Hyunjae, and the three friends from Today’s Fruit Shop sat side by side.

“That drama has a lot of fans; maybe I should take some photos and boost my followers…”

“It has a lot of drama fans?”

“Unnie, you didn’t know? It was huge on V! There are tons of people shipping the four of them.”

“Really?”

Whatever, Heeyeon quickly turned on straight cam recording and was taking photos of Seunghoon with her camera.

That was that, and work was work.

Don’t they change shops?

What did they do to his hair.

While she was bothered by the roughly chopped hair, her eyes accidentally met Hyunjae’s in the camera.

What, is he looking at me right now?

It could be thought that he was just looking at one of the many cameras, but he was definitely looking at her.

And for quite a long time.

When he looked at her for over a minute, she took her eyes off the camera and lifted her head to look at him, and when their eyes met, he smiled brightly and greeted her.

Have you been well?

His sparkling eyes and wide smile… made her think of someone she had loved.