MWFL 24

Chapter 24

Emptiness

Harin’s gaze, which had been fixed on the laptop screen, quickly shifted to Donggu.

“What is it?”

“Actually, you don’t have to follow all of his schedules like this. You’re only coming because my brother insisted.”

Harin calmly lowered her slightly raised eyelids.

“That’s my job. If the client wants it, I have to do it.”

“I heard you don’t normally even take on manager duties. Anyway, my brother can be a little self-centered, but that’s only because he’s simple-minded. He’s absolutely not a bad person.”

Donggu opened his eyes wide as though asking her to believe him. Harin quietly looked at him, a faint smile appearing around her lips.

“Yes. I know.”

“…You do? You know?”

It wasn’t exactly easy to know that.

At the look in Donggu’s eyes, Harin let out a silent chuckle.

Yes. I probably know him better than you do.

Suppressing her thoughts, she continued speaking.

“You know what the greatest strength is that helps someone endure a difficult person.”

“What is it?”

“Financial therapy.”

A strange glint flashed in Harin’s previously calm eyes.

“I briefly lost my senses and almost kicked away a gold nugget that had rolled right into my lap.”

Donggu awkwardly pulled the corners of his mouth upward.

“He looks perfectly normal, but his personality is completely self-centered. Every time he opens his mouth, he narrows his eyes and growls like he’s about to devour someone, making all affection for him disappear. But what can I do?”

Harin continued without taking a breath.

“Even if he’s a man who comes to pick someone up without being asked, and when I ask why he came, argues that there’s some rule saying he isn’t allowed to come get me, I still have to endure it even when I feel like smacking him right in the head. What else can I do?”

So she just wanted to badmouth Cha Shinwoo.

Donggu nodded understandingly.

“Regardless, Player Cha Shinwoo is an important client who brings a great deal of profit to both the company and me.”

People who pay a lot aren’t bad people.

After putting her words together, Donggu arrived at one simple conclusion.

In short, she was saying that no matter how unbelievably annoying Cha Shinwoo was, she intended to grit her teeth and endure him.

“So you don’t need to feel sorry.”

If that was how she felt, then there was nothing he could say.

“Yes. Understood.”

Donggu answered quickly, his expression now completely free of guilt.

“I was told the interview shoot for Banggeuri TV will take place on the field, and that we can watch from the stands.”

“Oh. Really? I didn’t get a chance to check that far.”

“I confirmed it over the phone yesterday. Let’s go out and watch together later. I’ll get some work done until then.”

Harin spoke in a crisp voice before turning her attention back to the laptop screen.

Thinking he shouldn’t disturb her, Donggu quietly remained in his seat.

Shinwoo stepped onto the field after passing through the dugout for his interview shoot.

“Please have a seat for a moment. We’ll start the interview right away.”

Following the producer’s instructions, he sat down on the chair placed in front of a small interview board.

The bitterly cold winds that had blown fiercely for several days had finally subsided. The air was still cold, but perhaps because of the clear sunlight, the weather reminded him of spring.

Shinwoo looked around with an indifferent expression until his gaze stopped in one place.

Joo Harin was sitting in the stands to his front left. The woman was seriously talking to someone on the phone.

Even during the short trip from the company to the stadium today, she had taken several work calls.

She’s probably even busier because of the situation I created.

“Right now, it looks like I’m going to grab just one guy and beat him to a pulp.”

Harin’s words suddenly flashed through his mind.

“Was it really worth doing all this after hearing something like that?”

No matter how many times he thought about it, he couldn’t understand why he had stubbornly insisted on keeping Joo Harin by his side.

At that moment, he had been seized by an inexplicable stubbornness, and all he could think was that he had to do it no matter what.

Today had been the same.

When he remembered the woman carefully walking across the precarious icy path, he had immediately felt that he had to go pick her up.

“Why did you do something like that to a woman who looks like she wouldn’t bleed even if you poked her with a needle?”

Remembering Harin’s expression, which had hardly looked pleased to see him, irritation quietly crept into him.

The man stared at Harin sitting in the stands through narrowed eyes, then gradually widened them.

The woman finished her call and slowly rose from her seat.

Then she quietly looked up at the sky, where sunlight was gently spilling down.

A subtle smile spread across her neatly closed red lips, and her large eyes curved softly.

A breeze blowing from somewhere sent strands of her fine hair fluttering through the air like waves.

At that moment, an inexplicable ripple stirred inside his chest.

It began like a tiny pebble dropping into a calm lake, but the ripple gradually grew into violent waves, churning through him as though disturbing the depths of the sea.

His eyes, which had clearly etched the woman into his mind, sank darkly like a deep blue-black ocean.

Amid the turmoil of an emotion he could not understand, a strange pain seeped into him, as though countless sharp objects were indiscriminately stabbing his chest.

Faced with a moment he could not put into words, he clenched his fists tightly.

“I’m sorry to have kept you waiting. We’ll start the interview now.”

The clear voice pulled him out of his confusion.

“Ah. Yes.”

Shinwoo tore his gaze away from Harin. The producer approached him and carefully examined his face.

“Player Cha, are you feeling unwell? You don’t look very well.”

“No. I’m fine.”

He answered calmly and slowly drew in a breath.

His chest filled with air, and the ripples and pain had disappeared.

But another emotion came to him.

Emptiness.

If he had to give it a name, that was the only word that came to mind.

.

.

.

After finishing the interview, Shinwoo headed toward the car with the two people who had been waiting for him.

“Manager Joo, are you going back to the company today as well?”

“Yes. I think I should.”

“I’ll give you a ride.”

Listening to their conversation, Shinwoo got into the back seat first.

“Yes. Thank you.”

Unlike last time, Harin didn’t refuse and got into the passenger seat.

“Hyung. I’ll drop Manager Joo off at the company before we go.”

Instead of answering, Shinwoo simply nodded and turned his gaze toward the window.

The car left the parking lot and began driving along the road bathed in the colors of sunset.

Shinwoo stared quietly at the sky before slightly furrowing his brows.

The strange emotion he had felt while looking at Joo Harin had come vividly back to him.

He slowly shifted his gaze toward the woman sitting in the passenger seat.

Sitting upright and looking straight ahead, the woman’s expression was as calm and tranquil as always.

His gaze lingered on the hair neatly tucked behind her ear before descending to her slender nape.

Not only her face, but her neck as well was covered in skin as clear and white as fresh snow.

It looked so soft and smooth that he felt an urge to touch it with his fingertips.

“Then let me confirm it. With your body, directly.”

At that moment, the image from his dream flashed through his mind—the woman sitting on his thigh with her pale skin exposed, whispering seductively.

“Ah, h-hurry up.”

Remembering the woman urging him on with her flushed face, heat began rising from deep within his body.

“What the hell are you doing, you pervert?”

The words he had intended to mutter internally slipped out aloud before he realized it.

“What? Hyung, what did you say?”

Donggu looked at Shinwoo through the rearview mirror, while Harin turned her head and looked directly at him.

Shinwoo quickly dropped his gaze, narrowly avoiding eye contact with Harin.

“Nothing. I was talking to myself. Don’t worry about it.”

He spoke in his usual blunt voice and turned his gaze back toward the window.

Wow. This is seriously driving me crazy.

I didn’t even touch her. Is this really happening just because I looked at her skin?

As he complained internally, he stared straight ahead again.

That was when he suddenly directed his gaze toward Harin.

“Ah. Player Cha Shinwoo.”

Harin abruptly turned her head, and their eyes met directly.

“Why?! What?! What?!”

His voice came out sharply because he was so startled.

Harin looked slightly bewildered before slowly opening her mouth.

“The CEO and Vice President said they’d like to have a meal with you sometime soon.”

Her red lips moved gently as she spoke in a quiet voice.

“When should I schedule it?”

Shinwoo’s heart began pounding as his gaze was drawn to her lips.

“A meal? Forget it. I’m not going.”

He rejected it outright and looked away from her.

“Player Cha Shinwoo.”

But Harin’s voice caught his attention again.

“What?”

“The CEO said he really wants to arrange a meeting at least once. If you find it burdensome, he’d like you to think of it simply as a casual company dinner and attend.”

Harin finished speaking in an even more refined voice and gently lifted the corners of her soft lips.

At that instant, his heart began pounding heavily, and a wave of heat surged deep through his body.

“I hate that kind of thing.”

“…Excuse me?”

“Meals! Company dinners! Things like that! I really, really hate them, so I’m not going!”

Do you really have to hate them that much?

Harin hid her sudden bewilderment and answered in her usual neat voice.

“Yes. Then I’ll pass that along.”

She turned her head forward again.

Holding his chest, where a powerful pounding continued to echo, Shinwoo swallowed a deep breath.

At the same time, he reached one conclusion.

“Right now, it looks like I’m going to grab just one guy and beat him to a pulp.”

Apparently, the one getting beaten to a pulp wasn’t the other person. It was him.