POV: Kang Ji-eun
I knew he would hate me.
I knew it before he turned.
Before he spoke.
Before the silence between us started pulling tight like a noose.
But I didn't realize how much it would hurt.
Standing there, in the doorway of that motel room, looking at the life Jun-woo had mapped out for us like a twisted storyboard—it wasn't just fear that clawed up my throat.
It was grief.
Not grief for my career.
Not grief for my reputation.
Grief for him.
For what I knew I was about to lose.
I stepped into the room.
The carpet stuck slightly under my shoes, the way cheap motel floors always do. The smell of mold and old coffee clung to the curtains. A broken TV in the corner flickered with static even though no one had turned it on.
But none of that mattered.
Because the real horror was on the walls.
Our lives, dissected. Printed. Pinned.
Every secret we thought we still owned.
Every lie we tried to tell ourselves was harmless.
Laid out like evidence in a trial we didn't know we were on trial for.
And Yoon Jae—
He didn't say a word.
He just stood there, clutching that torn letter in his hand like it was a weapon he didn't know whether to use against me or himself.
I took a step closer.
He flinched.
It was small.
Barely a movement.
But I saw it.
And it shattered something inside me that I didn't even know was fragile.
I wanted to say his name.
I wanted to apologize.
I wanted to fall to my knees and tell him everything I hadn't had the courage to tell him before—the nights I almost backed out of the contract, the mornings I woke up and hated myself for using him, the moments when looking at him felt like setting myself on fire.
But I didn't.
Because some things, once said, can't be unsaid.
And I didn't know if I deserved the right to speak first.
So instead, I looked at the wall.
At the photos.
At the script.
At the sticky notes scrawled in familiar, maddening handwriting:
> ACT III: THE FALL.
> Scene 7: Confession without Redemption.
I pressed my hand against my mouth, swallowing down the sob that wanted to claw its way out.
This wasn't a shrine.
It was a sentence.
And Jun-woo had written it years before we ever stood in that courtroom and signed those papers.
"You see it now?" Yoon Jae's voice broke through the static in my head.
I turned.
He wasn't looking at me.
He was looking at the script on the table, the one titled Final Draft.
But he wasn't reading it anymore.
He was memorizing it.
Burning it into his brain.
Like if he knew the ending, he could somehow rewrite it.
"I didn't know," I whispered.
He laughed. It was the coldest sound I'd ever heard.
"Didn't know what, Ji-eun? That he was obsessed with you? That he was watching? That he was writing you?"
"I didn't know it would end like this."
He finally looked at me then.
And for the first time since I met him—really met him—he looked at me like he didn't recognize me.
Like I wasn't the girl who sang him to sleep from the next room.
Like I wasn't the girl who laughed at his bad coffee and worse jokes.
Like I wasn't the girl who almost kissed him once in the rain and pretended it didn't mean anything.
"I'm not mad that you lied," he said, voice low, steady.
I blinked.
"I'm mad that you made me believe."
That broke me.
Not the accusation.
Not the disappointment.
The hurt underneath it.
The fact that somewhere along the way, I stopped being a contract.
And became a choice.
And he—
He thought he was a choice too.
I took a shaky step forward.
"Please," I said. "Don't do this."
"What am I doing?" he asked, soft and dangerous.
"Walking away."
He shook his head.
"Not yet."
The 'yet' hung there, heavy and sharp.
I didn't know how to pull him back.
I didn't know if I had the right.
The room around us blurred at the edges, too sharp and too soft all at once.
I hated Jun-woo.
I hated myself more.
Because somewhere deep down, in the part of me I tried to smother with fame and contracts and empty smiles—
I knew I'd started this.
I'd started it the night I decided survival was more important than love.
And now survival was all I had left.
He moved past me, toward the door.
I caught his sleeve without thinking.
"Don't," I said. It was barely a whisper.
He froze.
Didn't turn.
Didn't pull away.
But he didn't move closer either.
"What do you want from me, Ji-eun?" he asked.
I swallowed hard.
"Just… don't leave yet."
He exhaled slowly.
Like he was weighing something heavy.
Then—so quietly I almost didn't hear it:
"I can't promise I'll stay."
And then he walked out.
Leaving me standing there, in a room full of my own sins, holding nothing but a broken letter and a broken heart.
POV: Yoon Jae
The night air hit like a slap.
Sharp.
Mean.
Alive.
It smelled like wet concrete and cigarette smoke and something sour from the dumpster behind the building.
I didn't care.
I just needed to breathe air that hadn't been poisoned by her voice.
By her lies.
By the sinking weight of everything I hadn't been brave enough to ask until it was too late.
I crossed the cracked parking lot without a destination.
Hands in my pockets.
Head down.
Trying to convince myself this wasn't as bad as it felt.
It was just betrayal.
People survive worse.
But the lie that lodged in my chest wasn't about what she said.
It was about what she didn't.
Because part of me—stupid, desperate, reckless—still wanted to believe she cared.
Still wanted to believe there was something real underneath all the staged smiles and signed contracts.
Still wanted to believe that when she looked at me, it wasn't a calculation.
It was want.
The kind that doesn't make sense.
The kind that doesn't need permission.
The kind that's louder than survival.
I kicked a loose beer can across the lot.
It clattered and rolled into the gutter.
"Rough night?"
The voice came from the shadows near the vending machine.
I turned slowly.
Ready.
Expecting Jun-woo.
Wanting him, maybe.
At least then I'd have something solid to hate.
But it wasn't him.
It was someone else.
Tall.
Thin.
Wearing a too-expensive coat for a place like this.
Dark hair slicked back. Eyes hidden behind glasses that caught the yellow glow of the motel sign just wrong.
An agent.
Or a fixer.
Or something worse.
I didn't know yet.
He smiled when he saw me look.
Not friendly.
Predatory.
Like he knew exactly who I was and exactly what I was bleeding.
"Who the hell are you?" I said, voice flat.
He stepped closer.
Casual.
Like this was a business meeting and I was already on the payroll.
"Someone with a better offer than the one you're stuck with," he said.
I didn't move.
Didn't speak.
Didn't give him anything.
He took that as permission to keep talking.
"Your girl's a liability," he said. "You know that. I know that. Pretty soon, the whole damn country's going to know that."
I said nothing.
He smiled wider.
"Of course, you could stay loyal. Be the good husband. Go down with the ship."
I still said nothing.
"Or," he said, voice dropping lower, "you could walk away clean."
My fists clenched in my pockets.
"What's the price?"
He laughed.
Not mocking.
Just... amused.
"Funny thing about prices," he said. "They're easier to pay when you think you're buying your own freedom."
He pulled something from his coat.
A thin manila envelope.
Sealed.
He tossed it at my feet.
I didn't pick it up.
Not yet.
"What's in it?"
"Proof."
"Of what?"
"That you're the innocent one."
I stared at him.
He smiled like he already had the headlines drafted.
"Emails. Timelines. Messages. Enough to paint her as the manipulator. Enough to make you the poor, clueless writer who got roped into a fake marriage by a desperate idol clinging to fame."
I didn't move.
He leaned in slightly.
Low enough that only I could hear:
"Play the victim. Sell the story. Walk away a hero. Maybe even sell your own script about it. Hell, I'll even help you find a producer."
My stomach twisted.
Not because the offer surprised me.
Because part of me—the broken, bitter part—wanted it.
Wanted to hurt her the way she hurt me.
Wanted to stand in the ashes of this disaster and say, Look what you did. Look who you lost.
The man straightened.
Adjusted his glasses.
"All you have to do," he said, "is let the truth come out."
He stepped back into the shadows.
"Take your time," he said. "But not too much. The press moves fast when there's blood in the water."
Then he was gone.
Like he was never there.
I stared at the envelope at my feet.
Five minutes ago, I would've laughed at the idea.
Five minutes ago, I would've burned it.
But now?
Now I just stood there.
Frozen.
Listening to the hum of the broken neon light overhead.
Feeling the weight of every choice I'd ever made.
And realizing...
For the first time since this nightmare started—
I didn't know if I could save her.
Or if I even wanted to try.
The envelope felt heavier than it should have.
It wasn't thick. Maybe five pages inside. Ten at most.
But the weight of it—
What it meant.
What it could do—
It made my fingers ache.
I stared at it the entire walk back across the lot.
Didn't open it.
Didn't throw it away either.
I just walked.
Because I had no idea what I was walking into.
The room was still dark when I got back.
The only light was from the cheap bedside lamp—too yellow, too dim, buzzing faintly in a way that set my nerves on edge.
She sat on the floor now.
Not the bed.
The floor.
Legs folded, back against the wall, hair down and unbrushed, hands limp in her lap.
She didn't look up when I entered.
She didn't even flinch when the door clicked shut behind me.
It was like I wasn't there.
Or like she wasn't.
I stood in the center of the room.
The envelope still in my hand.
Still unopened.
Still radiating heat like it was alive.
She finally spoke.
Her voice was dry. Cracked. Hollow.
"You're leaving."
It wasn't a question.
I didn't answer.
She nodded slowly. "Right."
I dropped the envelope on the table.
The sound made her blink.
And then—carefully, cautiously—she stood.
Crossed the room barefoot.
Stopped two feet from me.
"I meant to tell you everything," she said.
"I know."
"I kept thinking I'd find the right moment."
"There wasn't one."
She nodded again.
Her eyes dropped to the envelope.
She didn't touch it.
Didn't ask.
Just knew.
"What is it?"
"An exit."
"And are you taking it?"
I didn't answer.
Because I didn't know.
Because even standing here now, five feet from the girl who tore the floor out from under me, I still didn't know if I wanted to walk away…
…or stay and burn with her.
She crossed her arms.
Not defensive.
Just cold.
The heater in the room clicked once, then died again.
It was too quiet.
"What does it say?" she asked.
"It paints me as the victim," I said. "Makes you the villain."
She flinched.
But only slightly.
"They want me to sell the story. Own it. Clean break."
"And you?" she asked. "Do you believe that version?"
I looked at her.
And that was the worst part.
The honest part.
Because I didn't.
Not really.
Not all the way.
But I wanted to.
Just enough to make this easier.
I turned from her.
Moved to the table.
Picked up the envelope.
Held it in both hands.
She watched me.
Didn't beg.
Didn't plead.
Just stood there.
Still.
Waiting.
"I don't know who you are," I said finally.
"I don't either," she said.
And god, the way she said that—
Like it hurt.
Like it had been hurting for a long time.
Like she was tired of waking up as a headline and falling asleep as a stranger to herself.
I looked down at the envelope again.
Then up at her.
And I said, very slowly:
"Tell me something true."
She swallowed.
Her lips parted.
Closed.
Opened again.
And then—
"I didn't mean for this to happen."
"Be more specific."
"You."
That stopped me.
"I didn't mean for you to matter."
My fingers tightened on the envelope.
"And now?"
She exhaled.
Stepped closer.
One more inch.
Then another.
Until we were nearly chest to chest.
She reached out.
Not to touch.
But to rest her palm lightly against the envelope.
Her voice barely above a whisper.
"I'll take it."
I blinked. "What?"
"If it makes it easier," she said. "If it makes it cleaner. I'll open it. I'll take the fall. I'll let them believe I manipulated you."
"I don't want that."
"Yes, you do," she said. "You want to hate me. Because if you don't, this whole thing gets harder."
I stared at her.
And she stared back.
Eyes glassy.
But dry.
Because she'd run out of tears days ago.
"I don't want to hate you," I said.
And her lip trembled.
Only for a second.
"Then what do you want?"
The question hung there.
Heavy.
Lethal.
I didn't know how to answer.
Did I want her to leave?
Did I want her to stay?
Did I want us to run?
Did I want us to fight?
Did I want to hold her?
Did I want to scream?
Did I want to be the man who could love her anyway?
Or the man smart enough not to?
I didn't know.
So I did the only thing I could do.
I let the envelope fall from my hands.
It hit the table with a soft papery sigh.
Untouched.
Unopened.
Unchosen.
And then the room phone rang.
We both jumped.
Neither of us moved.
It rang again.
And again.
Three times.
Four.
She stepped forward.
Picked it up.
"Hello?"
Her eyes widened.
A second later, she handed the phone to me.
"They said it's for you."
I took it slowly.
Pressed it to my ear.
A click.
Then a voice I hadn't heard in real time before.
Calm.
Controlled.
Surgical.
"You missed your cue, Writer. But that's okay. I went ahead and started Act Three without you."
Click.
Dial tone.
My stomach dropped.
Ji-eun looked at me.
"What did he say?"
I didn't answer.
Because before I could speak—
My phone buzzed.
One new message.
One new link.
One new headline.
I clicked it open.
And there it was:
> BREAKING: VELVET ROUGE'S KANG JI-EUN SECRETLY MARRIED – AND MISSING.
With a photo of her.
From this morning.
Outside the motel.
Walking beside me.
Frozen mid-step.
Face visible.
And the first comment already at 38,000 likes:
> "Is that her husband? He looks like a stalker."