Wonderstruck ✓

Chapter 6

Gun stared at his reflection in the mirror. He fixed his shirt once again, adjusted his pants, looked down to see if his socks match and just stared once again at himself. He was in his usual casual clothes although he felt uncomfortable wearing it to where he was going. He felt he needed to change to some formal attire. He was about to, thanks to himself for overthinking, but a familiar honk of a car made him jump and hurry downstairs. His manager, Mook, smiled at him when he got in her car and drove away.

"Are you sure they're okay with me wearing my casual clothes?" Gun asked.

"Yes," Mook reassured him. "They said you don't need to dress up that much. They just wanted to have a brief meeting before your actual photoshoot."

"Really?"

Mook rolled her eyes. "Yes. From what I know, they wanna know how you both style yourselves. They wanna know how they'd work on you guys when you do the photo shoot."

Gun and Mook are on their way to Salude Magazine Studio. The head staff that will work on their photo shoot requested for them to meet prior to the event proper. As to why, Gun doesn't know.

"Why do we have to meet them anyway?" Gun said as he held up his phone and checked if his hair was still in place. "You usually do all these meetings with the executives and I just appear on the day of the shoot and do some poses, and then boom, it's done."

"The Salude Magazine asked for this, Gun. Besides, how can a single meeting harm you? It's not like you're meeting your ex-lover. Why are you so nervous?" Mook asked.

"I am not!" Gun said, his voice a little higher than usual. "I'm just...okay. I probably am. Because I'm going to be in Salud Magazine. That's something you should be nervous about."

"Fair point. But I've worked with you ever since you started in this industry, Gun. I've never seen you fidget like this before." Mook tilted her body towards Gun. They were stuck in traffic. "And we haven't talked about you and Prince Off yet, Gun."

Gun looked away. "Talk about what, P'?"

"You said you're friends with Prince Off back when P'Joon was interviewing you. I could believe that. Everybody wants to be your friend," Mook said and started to drive again when the cars started to move. "But you act the other way around after. You're, like, afraid to see him today. What's up with you?"

"You aren't?" Gun said, trying to look for a possible way to divert the topic. "That's Prince Off, the only heir of the throne, son of King Ryan."

"I am very aware of that but thank you for your Royal lecture," She said and pulled up in the parking lot. "We are not done with this conversation yet but for now, let's focus on putting on our best smiles in front of them."

"Drop it, P'," Gun said and walked ahead of his manager.

He found himself standing a few feet outside the glass door where the meeting was to be held. He tried to rack his brain, trying to think of excuses he could use in order for him to get out of the situation.

Stomach ache? P'Mook will just say she has medicines. Headache? She'll still let me sit and listen. Fever? No, my temperature is not that high.

Mook appeared at his side. She excused himself a while ago to fix herself even though she looks fine to Gun. "I said you could go first. How kind of you to wait for me."

"P', can you just meet them without me? Please?" Gun pleaded.

Mook raised his eyebrow. "You're confirming some of my assumptions with what you just said, Gun. But no, I can't. We should go together."