Chapter 26

Just as Cha Yeon-woo — the coldest, most devastatingly handsome man in Korea’s entertainment industry — had a real name hidden behind him, Im Dong-min, Seo Ha-jun, who back then had been Korea’s warmest, most devastatingly handsome man, had turned out to have a real name of his own as well.

……Woon Seong-ha.

No wonder the name had felt a little familiar the first time I heard it! My memory really had been working fine.

Woon Seong-ha had been a huge celebrity, after all……

Seo Ha-jun had been widely known for both his acting and his looks — a total package. He could even sing well enough that he’d later gone on to host a music program.

Thinking about it, he’d had a connection to Do Je-hyeon, too. The two of them had starred together in a successful noir film, playing former prison cellmates, and had even been cast together on a travel show.

That movie…… people said it had zero artistic merit but was commercially unbeatable.

That was around the time the saying went around that commercial success at that level basically became art in itself.

[People trashed it for having no artistic merit, but Do Je-hyeon and Seo Ha-jun’s faces are straight-up Renaissance art] ★★★★★

[I just wanted to be squeezed in between them.. wish they’d fight over me…//] ★★★★☆

[Just looking at my lords’ faces made me laugh, it’s basically a comedy] ★★★★☆

There’d even been memes made out of it as “funny movie comments,” but the Woon Seong-ha in front of me now had no idea about any of that.

Maybe it was because it wasn’t a name likely to belong to many people. Or maybe he just hadn’t wanted his past known. Seo Ha-jun had worked under a stage name, hiding his real one, but once his past got dug up, his real name had come out right along with it.

I’d heard he’d been bullied over his family circumstances, had ended up dropping out of high school, and had drifted through a depressive period afterward.

Money had been so tight he could barely manage one meal a day, or so the story went.

Even so, to support the sick grandmother who had no one else in the world but him, he’d worked every part-time job he could find — until he debuted as a magazine model and became a sensation.

It’s not easy for a Korean to just walk past a warm, handsome face like that……

Anyway, from what I knew, Woon Seong-ha had been earning money as a magazine model when his talent for acting was discovered too, and he’d shot straight to stardom.

Of all people, Woon Seong-ha’s acting mentor had been Seong Hye-sim — my teacher.

In my first life, unable to climb out of her slump, my teacher had discovered Seo Ha-jun, and teaching him was what had brought her back to acting.

A little jealous, actually.

Sorry, Seong-ha, but in this life, I’m teacher’s number one student. Get in line, pal!

With Woon Seong-ha’s blank-faced expression right in front of me, I shouted that at the top of my lungs inside my head.

Still, Seo Ha-jun really was a phenomenal actor.

In my first life, I’d mostly taught myself acting by watching scripts and clips that circulated online. Seo Ha-jun’s performance videos had helped me enormously back then.

Especially the free-form audition clip from his very first project — the one that had built his image as an acting genius.

That clip alone must’ve had over ten million views.

I looked at Woon Seong-ha as if I envied him.

I wanted to grab him right then and tell him just how far his talent and star power would take him — that he’d become the kind of man every single person in Korea would recognize on sight, the sort who’d sail straight through meeting the in-laws.

Though if I actually said that out loud, he’d probably just think I’d lost my mind.

Anyway, so Yeongpung High had been the school where he’d been bullied.

When the whole scandal over his past had broken, the people who’d bullied Seo Ha-jun had been dug up one by one and dragged through the mud. Joo Su-yeon hadn’t been among them.

Had Uncle pulled some strings?

He was more than capable of it, after all — Uncle.

“Joo Su-deok, you bastard……”

“You’ve been muttering to yourself this whole time…… Are you okay?”

“Just hold still. Or better yet, go clean up the banana milk you threw!”

“That wasn’t because I didn’t like you. I just felt suffocated……”

It had just been a careless remark, but Woon Seong-ha shrank back and scrubbed furiously at the floor with a tissue. He seemed, deep down, to be bothered by having turned it down.

Maybe it was his gentle expression and that mop of fluffy hair when he stayed quiet like that, but he looked exactly like a golden retriever with its tail drooping.

That would explain the whole Wave Actors transfer thing, more or less.

Now that I’d realized Woon Seong-ha was Seo Ha-jun, questions I’d had started falling into place.

The biggest one being the Wave Actors transfer affair.

Rumors had gone around as stock-market gossip sheets claiming Wave Actors was desperate to sign Seo Ha-jun, but in the end, Seo Ha-jun had put out a statement saying he wouldn’t be transferring there after all.

If it was because of Joo Su-yeon, that would make sense.

Wave Actors’ true owner was my grandfather, Chairman Joo Tae-baek.

If Grandfather had been that eager to land talent like him, he would surely have shown his face in person.

Any ordinary person, hearing that Dongwoo Group’s Joo Tae-baek would be backing them, would have jumped at it without a second thought.

But Seo Ha-jun must’ve had nothing but bad blood with Dongwoo……

He wouldn’t have wanted to join hands with the family of the woman who’d tormented him to the point of dropping out, even if Grandfather himself had nothing to do with it.

A good idea suddenly came to me.

What if I gave Woon Seong-ha plenty of healing, got him into acting lessons earlier than he’d started in my first life……? If I raised him up carefully and delivered him to Grandfather ahead of schedule?

No, wait. First, the important thing is getting him interested in acting at all.

When his past had come out, Seo Ha-jun had once said in an interview that he’d started acting for the money, but that by then he’d come to love it more than anyone else.

I’ll make you fall in love with acting!

I won’t let you drift. I won’t let you starve…… For every bit that Joo Su-yeon made your life unbearable, I’ll make you want to live it.

And my teacher too…… it’d be good to introduce you to her. If a genius like Seo Ha-jun became her second student, I’d be honored myself.

Finishing that thought, I crouched down and met Woon Seong-ha’s eyes as he kept scrubbing the floor.

His brown eyes, unsettled at first, gradually steadied.

“Ha-jun — no, wait…… Seong-ha.”

“……Yeah.”

“Thanks for worrying about me, first of all. But I’m fine.”

“There’s no way Joo Su-yeon will just let this go……!”

“She won’t have a choice but to let it go.”

Ever since I’d come back to Jaedamjae, she’d been so busy reading Grandfather’s mood that even her usual petty harassment had tapered off.

“So stop worrying about that……”

I laughed it off lightly, then took hold of Woon Seong-ha’s hand and pulled it up.

“Want to skip class with me today?”

Come with me.

I’ll take you somewhere you can’t help but fall in love with.

“You…… you’re an actress?”

“Well, this is my first project.”

Where Joo Sae-i had brought Woon Seong-ha was a film set.

Sae-i’s scene wasn’t scheduled until the evening, so she’d meant to finish all her classes first — but she’d arrived at the set early instead, wanting to show Woon Seong-ha as much of it as she could.

“Is that a friend of Sae-i’s?”

“Yep. Handsome, right?”

“We could cast him as an actor right now.”

A staff member who’d gotten a look at Woon Seong-ha’s face smacked his lips. Without even bothering to hide the covetous look in his eyes, he gave Woon Seong-ha a couple of pats on the back.

“Take a good look around while you’re here. Hope we get to meet you as an actor next time.”

“……Thank you.”

Woon Seong-ha, looking embarrassed, ducked his head low. But before long, as if he’d never bowed it at all, he snapped his head back up straight.

For the first time in his life, actors’ performances were about to unfold right in front of him.

“……”

Whatever he’d said about coming to love acting in his first life hadn’t been empty words after all — Woon Seong-ha’s eyes kept lighting up as he watched the actors throw themselves into filming.

Getting her hair and makeup set while sneaking glances at Woon Seong-ha’s expression, Sae-i silently cheered inside.

This is it. This’ll work.

He sat still for hours, taking in the set with bright, wide-open eyes, and the sight of him looked for all the world like the gentlest puppy. He seemed to be nearly won over already.

It was hard to believe that the acting genius Seo Ha-jun was, because of her, on the verge of finding his dream this early.

“What role are you playing?”

“I’m……”

Barely managing to settle her overflowing heart, Joo Sae-i thought over what to tell him.

“Hm, a bold, no-nonsense girl. In the middle of a one-sided love.”

“Who’s the one-sided love with?”

“My mom.”

Yeon Do-yeon was, in a sense, in one-sided love with her own mother — a girl who got hurt and sank into gloom watching a mother who didn’t love her back, and who lit up again whenever she got even a scrap of attention.

Her relationship with Yoo Ha-jin mattered too, but what she meant to show Woon Seong-ha today was the scene with the mother.

“Let’s get Sae-i’s scene going. Keep an eye on her, friend — our Sae-i’s an ace.”

As Joo Sae-i stepped away, Woon Seong-ha’s eyes followed her.

Filming began right away.

“Do— Do-hun……”

The mother who’d lost her mind after her son’s death.

“Please, please……! How many times do I have to tell you — your brother is dead!”

“My son……”

“Why am I still an afterthought even after my brother’s dead. Mom, why do you……”

“……”

“Why do you keep making me feel so pathetic……”

A daughter in one-sided love with a mother who wouldn’t look at her, starving for attention.

Watching Joo Sae-i’s performance, Woon Seong-ha clenched his fist tight.

A thought struck him, just then.

That he wanted to try learning to act.

It was the moment Woon Seong-ha’s tightly shut-in world began to open up wider, because of Joo Sae-i.