By Zephyria “What were you talking about in the car for so long? I was bored to death waiting.”
A ghost would have been better. Lee Seo-kyung was sitting with his legs crossed in a high-backed armchair.
“Did you have car sex?”
“H-how… are… you… here…”
Even though he spoke, it wasn’t words. It was a scream-like sound that escaped his lips. The mansion had tight security. No one could just open the main entrance and take the elevator.
Lee Seo-kyung chuckled, as if to say, ‘What kind of naive question is that?’
“Why are you so surprised? Do you think there’s anywhere in Korea I can’t go?”
His casual, almost saccharine tone, as if they were close acquaintances. The reality of the person in front of him, Lee Seo-kyung, slowly solidified. Choi Hong-seo’s breathing grew more rapid.
His shirt tightly cinched his neck and wrists, and even with his legs crossed, his pants’ hems were lifted without revealing any skin, a testament to his obsessive attire. Lee Seo-kyung was wearing the tight clothing like a corset or armor, yet Choi Hong-seo’s breath was being constricted. Haa, hugh, h… hugh…
“It’s become too difficult to see our Hong-seo’s face. So I had to come myself.”
Lee Seo-kyung placed his hands on the armrests of the armchair and stood up. Choi Hong-seo couldn’t even step back, even as he clearly saw him approaching. He could do nothing but pant, his mouth agape. Lee Seo-kyung stopped a couple of steps away and bent down to meet his eye level.
“You’ve gotten even prettier?”
Choi Hong-seo’s entire body broke out in goosebumps at the smile and gaze, as if he were looking at a beloved. His hand reached out and grasped Choi Hong-seo’s chin.
“You haven’t changed at all from back then. Even though so much time has passed. Who would think you’re twenty-seven? That’s how good my eye is.”
His chin had only just been touched, yet he couldn’t move, as if his entire body were bound. He couldn’t defy or resist. He felt a deadly fear towards the man before him.
No, it wasn’t just deadly fear; for Choi Hong-seo, Lee Seo-kyung was death itself. He was the one holding Choi Hong-seo’s life in his hands.
The smile that had been feigning kindness slowly turned cold, and his thin, seemingly neurotic lips twisted.
“I heard our Hong-seo has become quite popular lately? So are CEO Myeong and you looking down on me?”
“I… I’ve… been busy… with overseas… schedules…”
His lips trembled as he made excuses.
While he had no choice but to comply with CEO Myeong’s wishes, CEO Myeong didn’t scare him. But Lee Seo-kyung did. Whether he wanted to admit it or not, his body and mind reacted that way. CEO Myeong had managed and exploited him, but he was strictly heterosexual and had never laid a hand on Choi Hong-seo, the ‘product.’
But Lee Seo-kyung…
No one he had encountered in the numerous ‘entertainment’ sessions he was forced into after Lee Seo-kyung could surpass Lee Seo-kyung. No, even the combined revulsion of all those people couldn’t compare to Lee Seo-kyung.
To Choi Hong-seo, ‘that thing’ was not human. The things ‘that thing’ had done were not acts that could occur in the human world.
Lee Seo-kyung was terrifying. He felt fear. He didn’t want to, but he couldn’t help it.
Haa… Lee Seo-kyung let out a deep sigh, blowing it onto Choi Hong-seo’s face.
“So, Hong-seo, why did you make me angry when you tremble like this? Hmm?”
“……”
“If CEO Myeong was going to act like that, you should have come to your senses.”
Lee Seo-kyung looked at Choi Hong-seo like a magnanimous superior pitying a subordinate who had made an unintended mistake. Seeing Choi Hong-seo unable to move, he clicked his tongue.
“Hong-seo.”
He wanted to shut that mouth that called him by that name. He wanted to curse and rage.
“I really liked you. It was almost love at first sight. That’s why I waited so long to sleep with you for the first time.”
“……”
“You know I don’t like… forcing things. But when Hong-seo kept refusing the second round, I had no choice then.”
Lee Seo-kyung shrugged, feigning regret.
Lee Seo-kyung was talking about the incident seven years ago. Choi Hong-seo’s entire body began to tremble again. It was the body’s reaction, suffocating from fear.
“You know I don’t like leaving evidence, like with filming. But… haa… if they don’t come to me on their own, I have no choice. I have to have insurance for when things go wrong.”
Lee Seo-kyung’s hand lightly rested on Choi Hong-seo’s shoulder.
“Even then, I had no intention of forcing you, right? You understand?”
A third-generation chaebol customer who kept pestering CEO Myeong because he wanted to have a second round with Choi Hong-seo.
No, according to Myeong Do-hoon, he was not just Gucci, but Hermes, Chanel.
Myeong Do-hoon had told Choi Hong-seo that he had reached his limit in refusing, so he should meet him directly and refuse. Feeling sorry for Myeong Do-hoon, who had been constantly harassed by that third-generation chaebol customer, Choi Hong-seo had no choice but to agree.
The meeting place was a private room in a high-end restaurant attached to a hotel, and at the time, Choi Hong-seo couldn’t imagine that anything so terrible could happen in such a place.
But the world that the newly twenty-year-old Choi Hong-seo couldn’t imagine was boundless.
In a hotel room where that restaurant was located, Choi Hong-seo was raped multiple times, and was forced into all sorts of perverted acts, unspeakable at the time, that a twenty-year-old Choi Hong-seo had never heard of before and still hasn’t, with every single step of the process filmed.
That was Choi Hong-seo’s weakness, the one he was caught with by Lee Seo-kyung and Myeong Do-hoon. The first weakness.
And they began to force Choi Hong-seo into ‘entertaining’ using it. In that way, they continued to accumulate second, third… twentieth… fiftieth weaknesses.
At the time, Choi Hong-seo had one of two choices.
To do as they told him. Or, to refuse and report them, and have the photos and videos taken be released to the entire world.
If CEO Myeong was one thing, Lee Seo-kyung was the son of a prominent chaebol family, known to everyone in South Korea. Choi Hong-seo couldn’t even entertain the hope that he could win by standing up to such a person, by reporting such a person.
As Lee Seo-kyung gently massaged Choi Hong-seo’s shoulders, he casually flicked his eyes.
“I offered you 30 million won to go on to the second round with me, how many times did I say that through CEO Myeong? Wouldn’t it have been more comfortable for both of us if you had just chosen and come on your own? Tsk.”
When there was no option not to do it, how could it be called a ‘choice’?
He screamed it countless times in his mind, but he couldn’t move his tongue to speak.
He wanted to resist, to shout, to fight back, but his body wouldn’t obey. He felt shame at the fact that he felt fear towards this trash, worse than an animal, before his eyes.
Lee Seo-kyung suddenly applied strong pressure to the hand massaging his shoulder. Then, he tilted his head askew and looked at Choi Hong-seo.
“Anyway, what I want to say is, you were a special being, an exception to me in every way. Right?”
“……”
“But if you treat me like this, I’ll be very disappointed. Won’t I?”
Lee Seo-kyung released his grip on Choi Hong-seo’s shoulder and took a few steps back. Then, he took out his phone from his inner jacket pocket and began typing something.
Without even looking at him, looking down at his phone, Lee Seo-kyung said casually, as if it were unimportant.
“Hong-seo, I know who you guys are relying on to act so bold.”
“……”
At those words, spoken in passing, Choi Hong-seo’s heart was thrown against a solid wall and shattered.
Lee Seo-kyung was clearly the one holding Choi Hong-seo’s life in his hands.
“That Hyung is truly… not someone who would be lurking in the gutters. I never thought that model student would end up being a celebrity sponsor. Haha… Well, I guess Hyung has finally learned how to spend money. Come to think of it… our Hong-seo is quite amazing, isn’t he?”
“That’s not it.”
It was the first time Choi Hong-seo’s words came out clearly. Lee Seo-kyung, who had been looking at his phone, turned his head to look at him. But his expression was still unremarkable.
“The Vice President never paid me, nor does he intend to. CEO Myeong… is just deluding himself and making a fuss.”
Still trembling, he spoke directly to Lee Seo-kyung. His lips, which had refused to open no matter how hard he tried, and his tongue, which had refused to move, now grudgingly obeyed, albeit stiffly.
A smile spread across Lee Seo-kyung’s previously expressionless face. A chilling smile that, to someone who didn’t know Lee Seo-kyung, might even seem kind and warm.
“What? Our Hong-seo has fallen in love too?”
The expression ‘Hong-seo too’ grated on his ears, but he didn’t have time to dwell on it. Chuckling as if he couldn’t contain his amusement, Lee Seo-kyung approached him again. Then, he firmly gripped Choi Hong-seo’s cheeks with one hand.
“Because you’re in love, you’re protecting the Vice President?”
When Choi Hong-seo tried to shake his face away, Lee Seo-kyung tightened his grip even more. The face and eyes so close to him made him want to vomit.
“Hey… really… it’s so touching, I’m moved to tears.”
Lee Seo-kyung, with an annoyed expression, pushed Choi Hong-seo’s face away with his palm.
“I told you the truth. If you don’t believe me, investigate!”
Lee Seo-kyung stepped forward, pushing Choi Hong-seo back a few steps, and then kicked a shopping bag with his foot.
“Here or there… why are you all acting like such fucking idiots?”
Choi Hong-seo hugged the shopping bag to his chest.
“Do you think I came here without knowing whose house this is?”
“Th-this house… it’s not like that… Ugh!”
As Choi Hong-seo was pushed back, his shoulder hit the front door, and Lee Seo-kyung violently ground Choi Hong-seo’s right cheek against it.
“Because Lee Hae-sung coddles you a bit, you think you’re something?”
And then, mockingly, he patted Choi Hong-seo’s cheek. The cheek that Lee Hae-sung had so preciously cradled, like a fragile piece of art.
“If Lee Hae-sung knew, what? Would he do some troublesome cleanup for a dirty stray dog? Is ARA’s Lee Hae-sung that free? After going through all that, are you still that naive, Hong-seo? Huh?”
“I never asked for anything like that from the Vice President.”
“Oh, fuck, really? Are you having such a noble love?”
“……”
“Here or there… it’s hilariously pathetic.”
Lee Seo-kyung, muttering curses, raised his arm and scratched his forehead. Then, pacing anxiously in the elevator hall, he looked at his phone again.
“Hong-seo.”
Then, in an instant, he strode back to Choi Hong-seo and shoved the phone screen right in front of his face.
“Shall I share our memories with your beloved Vice President? Huh?”
“……”
The photo on the screen was one of the dozens, hundreds, of photos Lee Seo-kyung had taken seven years ago. The moment he saw it, Choi Hong-seo clutched the shopping bag tightly and bent over, retching.