Three Days Ago, Friday, Riti
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I arrived at the cafe after getting her number and calling her. I had hoped she'd be free for such a request, honestly.
The cafe was quite empty. She had long dark hair and wore big sunglasses and a thick, stylish scarf. I sat across from her awkwardly, and we silently looked at each other for a moment before I started laughing despite myself.
"Is this supposed to be your disguise, Baek Hee?"
She harrumphed and looked away. "What do you want? If it's not important, I'm ready to leave right now."
I smiled and shook my head. "Please don't." I took the little flash drive I had and a little printout of the picture I had of her, and placed them in front of her.
"I took this the very first night I saw you. When you had come to my university to perform and didn't realize I was in the building. I didn't know who you were, and I thought nothing more of the picture. But now..."
"Now you're using it to threaten me?" She chuckled mirthlessly and with anger.
"Listen to me. Yesterday, I was told I had the chance to give this picture to a Dispatch journalist... strike first to make sure you can't harm Jimin." At the sound of his name, she looked up and glared at me.
"Well then, why didn't you? Why do you have to tell me this? Are you here to gloat?"
I groaned and rolled my eyes, "Hey, girl, do you never listen?"
She stopped talking.
"I came here to hand you the files instead. Gunho said it was stupid of me, but... here I am." I sighed.
"Is this blackmail?"
"No! No, I'm just... giving them to you. They're your pictures, your moments. You deserve to do what you want with them."
She looked incredibly confused, and then sat up a little straighter. "Why?"
I don't know. "Because... you have dreams too. You and Jihun. You have people who care about you, who are relying on you, who are rooting for you. You may be doing things to... embarrass them, but I can't. I thought that I couldn't sit around and do nothing while the person I cared for was being tortured like this. But..." My eyes were sore at this point, honestly, but I still squeezed them shut for a moment to gather my emotions. "But saving him shouldn't mean bringing you down. I have dreams too, you know? I wouldn't like it if I was collateral damage..."
The waiter brought me some water and a cup of coffee I'd ordered earlier.
I continued, "I don't think women should bring each other down. And I don't think you should be judged by the world because of your actions regarding one person."
I swallowed the lump in the throat. "Besides, I think if this leaked you would be vilified far far beyond what you deserve, or what Jimin would get."
Baek Hee's brows were furrowed, and she leaned in to my side of the table. "From what I saw... I thought you loved him."
That was it, I couldn't hold it in anymore, and my tears started spilling. My lips trembled, making it hard for me to respond, and I quickly tried to wipe my tears away with my gloves, but they kept coming.
"But I don't hate you." I tried to steady my breathing Baek Hee awkwardly cleared her throat.
Her hand tentatively reached out to touch mine, and she gave it a little squeeze before pulling away right away. "There there. Stop embarrassing me in public."
I pressed my sleeves to my eyes to hide them.
"You've... kept this all bottled in the whole time, huh?" She asked.
"So has Jimin." I murmured.
"How old are you?"
"18."
She looked at me in surprise, and then ruffled my hair. "Then call me with proper honorifics."
I was a little surprised to see her react the way she did. She looked a little worn out herself. Her dark circles were visible under those sunglasses.
She rolled her eyes when she saw me looking at her intently. "I can't help you. You know that, right?"
I used a napkin to wipe the moisture off my face and shook my head. "I didn't come here to ask for your help. I just came here so I could be honest with myself. After everything, I'm not sure I can say I like you at all, but I'm positive I wouldn't do that to you."
I got up to leave, and turned back around to face her gaze. "Seeing as you actually came here to talk to me, though, all I have to say is that it's in your hands now." She raised an eyebrow at that and I just gathered myself and left, but not before letting her know that I was handing over my only copy of the photo.
I walked out with my heart low but my chin held high. I wondered if Jimin would consider this a betrayal. No. I hadn't betrayed my senses, I hadn't betrayed myself. And he should have that faith that I do.
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Baek Hee
Clever. So very clever. She came in here to manipulate me and get me to do her bidding. Great move, you little minx...
And yet, I sat there after she left, smiling at the little flash drive she'd left behind.
None of what she said or did was non-genuine. None of it was a lie. But she wasn't wrong. I wouldn't have agreed to show up for no reason; The girl who I'd seen playing the game so well had piqued my curiosity for quite a while now. She didn't disappoint.
"Getting ambitious, hm?" I tore up the paper with the picture and tossed it into the trash with the flash drive.
Opening my phone up, I looked for other, better photos of me with Jihun, and after sifting through for the best ones, went back to the office to print them. Just a blurry picture of us kissing from a distance won't convince anyone. We had bigger guns than that, and a bluff or two about nudes wouldn't hurt.
Don't get me wrong. I didn't do this for Jimin or for his new girl. Much like Riti, I was doing this for myself. We were ringmasters running the show, not pawns to entitled men, and we could decide what was wrong and right for ourselves.
And at the end of the day... it made sense. I hadn't really talked to Riti before but the way Jimin felt about her... it made sense. She was quite amusing, I almost hoped we'd meet again, despite how unlikely it seemed.
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The Next Day, Saturday, Baek Hee
Once the meeting was over, I saw most of the company executives glare at me as they left the conference room, but the others shot me grateful glances. They were making factions based on whether or not you should blackmail people, can you imagine? Our company had not leaked the celebrity dating news to Dispatch, but we'd used it to our advantage when threatening BigHit. Now, however, the company executives were worried that maybe that news was about us: Jihun and me. The PR directors started preparing right away just in case it was about us, and the stress during the meeting had built up in a different direction. People had forgotten the goal to blackmail.
Kahn waited till everyone except Jihun had left before turning to me and laughing, "You viper! I wasn't expecting that from you."
"She got you demoted, not me. Besides, it's funny to see you support my side on this. Are you feeling quite alright, Kahn?"
"You're always acting so plucky. Don't forget I met you when you were fifteen. Besides, I'm only doing this for myself, not for her. I should take some pride in the company I work for."
I smiled. "I'm doing this for myself too."
Look at us, we'd turned into a bunch of softies.
He sighed and looked at Jihun. "You compromised your and his work in the process though. I didn't know about you two."
I looked at Jihun, who shook his head and answered, "It doesn't matter. I just don't understand why you'd give up the opportunity for revenge like that."
"If we had to take revenge for every little thing we do to each other, I think I owe Jimin far more than he could ever owe me. And Kahn, I think both of our groups are doing well enough that they won't be too angry at us. Well, 4Ever is quite popular, but maybe I overlooked you a little, Jihun. I'm sorry."
He smiled. "Don't be sorry. I stopped caring about that a while ago. Why do you think I'm trying new things out these days? I just want to follow you and stay close to you."
Kahn rolled his eyes and left the room, but despite my usually tough demeanor I smiled at Jihun. Love was hard for me, but little by little, I think I'd learned to at least trust him.