Chapter 136: Fan Meeting Shadows

“Start!”

The MC shouted the beginning, and Jibin started explaining the word in front of him, flailing his arms on both sides.

“Uh! This…….”

“You can’t say it!”

“Ah, right.”

The full-fledged fan meeting tour for Today’s Fruit Shop had begun starting from Seoul.

“What is that~? No, I really don’t know?”

“Ugh! You idiot!”

As I kept fumbling without getting the right answer, Jibin couldn’t hide his frustration and clenched his fist, yelling.

“Idiot? Wow~ How smart am I!”

“5! 4! 3! 2! 1! Stop~ Jibin-Hyunjae team with 2 questions, Taewoon-Jeuk team with 5 questions, the victory goes to Taewoon-Jeuk team!”

“Woo~ Thank you.”

“Sorry for winning so easily.”

Taewoon and Jeuk teased me and Jibin with relaxed smiles.

“Hey, you don’t know this?”

“Hyung explained it weirdly! Everyone else doesn’t know either, right?”

“What are you talking about? Everyone here knew! You all got it, right?”

Jibin and I stared at the fans, demanding answers, but the fans were busy laughing at us.

“You two can’t do this here~”

“In my opinion, you’re both the same.”

“They’re identical.”

Following “Explain with Your Body,” there were various contents like guessing trending memes, individual member talent stages, recreating famous drama scenes, and more.

“Now~ Bear heart~ Ah, so cute~”

“Ugh! Why is this hyung like this.”

“Hahaha!”

“Kyaa!”

The more our eyes squinted and we struggled, the more the fans cheered. 

It was the first fan meeting, so I was tense at the beginning, but the fans’ reactions were good, and the atmosphere among us was fun, like we were just playing.

“It’s a shame, but it seems we have to close the fruit shop opening event here.”

“Aaa~”

“I’m really sad too~ Thank you so much to everyone who loved Today’s Fruit Shop a lot, and thank you for coming here!”

We held hands with the members, bowed at the waist, and greeted, and thus the drama fan meeting ended.

“Wow~ That was so fun, right?”

That was what I said as soon as we came down from the stage.

“Fun? It was fun?”

Taewoon rushed over as soon as he heard me.

“The stage is really fun.”

“Agreed.”

“Honestly, when they said we’d do it here at first, I thought we wouldn’t fill the seats.”

I quietly agreed with Jeuk’s words. 

It wasn’t an idol fan meeting, and 5,000 seats for a drama fan meeting honestly seemed a bit overkill.

“You guys really don’t know the world. With Taewoon hyung here, this is basic~”

“No, our fans probably don’t have much share? My fans would rather spend the money on concerts or fan signings than come to this fan meeting.”

“Huh? Then…….”

“Pure drama fans.”

I’d heard there were a lot of drama fans, but I didn’t expect this many. People liked the youthful story of your friends more than I thought.

“Probably the overseas fan meetings will be different again?”

“That sounds fun too!”

With the excitement of overseas concerts in mind, we successfully concluded the first drama fan meeting.

“Wasn’t it more fun than expected?”

“Yes, it was fun.”

The games were more varied than expected, and the set looked pretty; you could tell they put effort into it.

“Honestly, I had zero expectations because these things are all cliché.”

“Have you been to other drama fan meetings? Don’t they usually not do drama fan meetings?”

Heeyeon had never heard of a drama fan meeting while fangirling over Jaehyun.

“It’s possible because the actors are all rookies and it started on OTT. BL dramas or web dramas do it quite a bit. There are a lot of enthusiasts, and loyalty is high.”

It was very different from back then, when she always did major dramas and had to fight with the haters after the drama ended.

Is this the perk of being a rookie?

“Unnie, but can you send me the video of Taewoon you took earlier? Please~”

The woman talking to Heeyeon wasn’t someone she knew originally; they just happened to sit next to each other today and started talking for the first time.

She was friendly and approached Heeyeon without hesitation, and since they were neighborhood residents, they decided to go home together.

“I’ll send it. I don’t need it anyway.”

“Kyaa~ Thank you! Unnie, you’re really golden-handed! Almost like a home master level?”

Not knowing much about Heeyeon since she was Taewoon’s fan, she approached after seeing her photo skills.

“I did some photography work a few times in the past.”

“Right? Somehow you gave off a professional vibe. Every photo is like a work of art.”

She actually couldn’t take her eyes off Heeyeon’s camera during the short breaks and kept exclaiming in admiration.

“Ah, but honestly, today’s fan meeting was torn up by Jeong Hyunjae’s cover stage. He dances better than I thought?”

Hyunjae covered a refreshing concept hit song from a rookie idol. On stage, sparkling, he was at a level where he could pass as a newly debuted idol.

Ah, next fan meeting I need to bring some mercenaries.

It was regrettable to the point of grudge that she couldn’t capture that from various angles.

“I thought we came out late, but there are still a lot of people.”

“Yeah.”

She thought people had thinned out since they came out a bit late, but people kept pouring out.

“Ah.”

Then, at that moment, the person walking ahead suddenly changed direction and bumped into the woman next to Heeyeon.

“Sorry.”

The person who bumped nodded their head, and Heeyeon naturally looked at that person.

“Huh?”

And as soon as she saw the person, she recognized them. But the woman, upon seeing Heeyeon, immediately covered her face in a hurry and fled with quick steps.

“What? Unnie, do you know that person?”

“Why is that person here?”

It was someone she hadn’t seen in years, but she recognized them at once.

“Why? Who is it?”

“A complete psycho.”

It was someone she’d never spoken to once, but the reason she could recognize them immediately even after a long time.

“Why, why? How do you know them?”

“Hah, no way…… it can’t be that.”

The woman next to her urged curiously at Heeyeon’s reaction.

“From back when you were fangirling, a fellow fan? Or a schoolmate? What kind of relationship?”

“A sasaeng.”

“What?”

“A crazy sasaeng bitch.”

At Heeyeon’s words, she couldn’t hide her surprise, mouth agape.

“Whoa! Really? A s-sasaeng?”

“Yes.”

“How vicious a sasaeng to make unnie remember her?”

Unless it was a small fandom, it wasn’t easy for fans to remember each other’s faces.

“She was extremely vicious. She probably got dragged to the police station a few times?”

“Wow…… That’s no joke.”

Having been an idol fan for a long time, she could easily tell that getting dragged to the police station meant it wasn’t ordinary.

“Unnie, can I ask what idol you fangirled before liking Hyunjae? No way that person is fangirling our Taewoon, right?”

It would be troublesome if a psycho like that attached after finally calming down as years piled up from being plagued by sasaengs.

“Not an idol.”

“Huh? Not an idol?”

Heeyeon felt anxiety creeping in.

Tastes don’t change easily.

If they liked the same person, and met again here, the probability was high that they liked the same person again.

“Ah…….”

“N-no way. How many years ago was that?”

“Almost…… about 3 years.”

“Then she must have grown up by now. Looking at it, she seems to have de-fanned.”

Rather than de-fanning, the person she was fangirling disappeared, forcing her to de-fan, but time had passed, and seeing her at the fan meeting, she seemed different from before.

Plus, she ran away when she saw me.

They didn’t talk, but they were aware of each other’s existence subtly. 

Heeyeon was a long-time fan who followed all events and supports, so she was famous among fans as a major fan, and she was famous as a psycho sasaeng.

“She ran away seeing me, so probably embarrassed?”

That was the hope. 

In the past, when they bumped into each other following the same schedules, they would glance, check, and curse each other; they never avoided.

“Of course! She must be embarrassed to see unnie who knows her dark history.”

“I really hope so.”

Knowing how much Jaehyun suffered because of sasaengs, she didn’t want to pass that pain to Hyunjae.

“Don’t worry! Unnie, are you going to Japan too?”

***

“I’m going to Japan.”

“Wow~ So jealous. I can’t go to Japan because of work…… Instead, I’m planning to go to Thailand!”

And so, the two went back to talking about the fan meeting as they headed home.

“Damn~ Why meet in a place like this.”

It had been 3 years, but Song-ah clearly remembered Heeyeon.

“Unlucky bitch.”

That’s how Song-ah remembered Heeyeon. 

It was disgusting how she stuck right by Jaehyun’s side, acting all high and mighty just because she was a long-time fan.

“Looking at her, it’s definitely Jeong Hyunjae, her taste is so pine tree consistent.”

But Song-ah, saying that, also liked Hyunjae. Liking Hyunjae was really by chance.

Wow…… Who is that?

Really, no reason, just walking down the street, saw Hyunjae’s cosmetics ad, and fell for him. That’s how she ended up at this fan meeting.

“Annoying.”

Song-ah had erased everything about Jaehyun from herself after that day, so meeting someone who could remind her of Jaehyun was unwelcome.

Ah, whatever. What does it have to do with me.

She’d quit the sasaeng stuff, she was just a normal fan, so no need to meet again anyway, she tried to shake off the thoughts that kept coming up.

But unlike her head, her heart was racing fast, and the thoughts she tried to shake dug in deeper.

“Haa, no. It’s fine. It has nothing to do with me.”

When her head wouldn’t listen, she muttered aloud, trying to shake off the thoughts.

“Aaaah!”

But the thoughts didn’t shake off, and she grabbed her head, screamed, then hurriedly ran to a corner of the building, squatted down, and hid her body.

“It’s okay. It’s not your fault. It’s okay. It couldn’t be helped. It’s okay.”

People who saw her muttering with her hands wrapped around her head whispered.

“What? Is she crazy?”

“Probably a nutcase.”

“Hey, pretend you don’t know.”

But nothing reached Song-ah’s ears.

“Please stop. Stop it.”

She stayed there like that, and only left the place when no one was left at the venue.

***

Kingdom Entertainment.

“We’re totally lucky. It’s not common these days to shoot and broadcast so quickly.”

“Yeah. It worked out great.”

The broadcast date for Love Some, which finished shooting last winter, was set.

It was scheduled for late summer or fall, but the lead in the previous work caused an accident, making broadcast difficult, so the slot was pulled forward.

The sooner it broadcasts, the better.

These days, getting a slot is like picking stars from the sky; this was definitely an opportunity.

“Internally at the broadcaster, the reviews for Love Some are good, so they’re pushing it.”

The broadcaster internally previewed the upcoming shows, and Love Some got good evaluations.

“It’ll do well.”

“It has to. It’s your first lead role.”

Probably, my ability as a lead in this work would be evaluated, and future roles would be decided.

I heard The Forest Painted by Clouds is releasing as a tentpole this summer too.

“Huh? Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Good news.”

I need to solidify my position with this opportunity.

“And since you’re here, take this and read it.”

And Hyungkyu handed me a script.

“What’s this?”

“Not the lead. But the material is fresh, so it looks good; read it once.”

“What’s the material?”

I’d read a lot of scripts thanks to Jiwon, but this was a first-time work.

“A man who can’t die lives waiting for the reincarnation of the woman he loves, falls in love again with her reincarnated self, but the male lead has a dual personality.”

“Dual personality?”

“Yeah, why, cheesy?”

“No, not that…….”

What, this has the same material as Hwang Eunah’s work?