I stopped the car in front of a red-brick low-rise and called Chae-eun. It was Chae-eun's home on the outskirts of Gyeonggi Province.
"I'm here. Come out."
It was awkward that the audition had been set before she could have any lessons, but I couldn't just sit still for that. By lunchtime tomorrow, when the audition would be held, I had to have Chae-eun perfectly prepared.
It looked like the script practice would have to happen in the car. At least I had the car the company had lent me, which was a relief.
The sensor light at the building's entrance came on, and Chae-eun appeared. Maybe because I'd called when I set out, Chae-eun had the face of someone who'd been wide awake, even at this late hour of the night.
"I told you to sleep until I called."
"How am I supposed to do that when a fire's suddenly dropped on my feet......?"
I hadn't told Chae-eun that the 'Loner' audition was a formality, that Noh Jeong-ah had been pre-selected, or that the schedule had changed because of Noh Jeong-ah.
After all, there was no need to crush Chae-eun's spirit for nothing.
Managing the schedule is entirely the manager's territory, so there was nothing to be done even if Chae-eun vented her complaints. I quickly changed the subject.
"You're not cold, are you? Will it be all right to run lines in the car?"
The night air was still chilly. If she catches a cold or something while practicing the script in the car, that's the worst case.
"Let's go up to my place."
"To your place?"
I hadn't thought we would be going to Chae-eun's home, so I was a little flustered.
"My grandmother's asleep, so please keep quiet."
"You live with your grandmother, just the two of you?"
"Yes."
In the last world, Du-hwan had called Chae-eun a girl holding up her whole household. He'd said her sick grandmother was in a nursing hospital, but it seems they're living together now.
I hurried after Chae-eun as she went into the building.
"Excuse me for intruding."
When I stepped into the dark home and offered the greeting as I took off my shoes, Chae-eun hastily raised a finger and held it in front of her lips.
"Shh! You mustn't wake my grandmother."
"Ah......."
Before I, feeling sheepish, could even compose my expression, the door on the left, past the small kitchen and living room that adjoined the entryway, opened to reveal Chae-eun's lit room.
The checkered bedding and the stuffed dolls placed here and there showed the tastes of twenty-year-old Chae-eun, but the clothes hanging on the rack installed along one wall made the small room look even more cramped.
Chae-eun sat cross-legged in front of a low desk and switched on a lamp.
"My grandmother did want to see you, oppa. She saw the news, you know."
"Was she pleased?"
"Of course. She said I did so well. She said thank you."
Perhaps because she'd pictured her grandmother, Chae-eun blushed.
"I knew she'd be happy if I got on TV, but I didn't know the news would come first."
At a glance, this isn't a comfortable household. In an old house, looking after her grandmother, she works herself to death all alone. And all the while, on the outside, she acts as if it's nothing.
She's different from the me of the last world, who crept away into the shadows in the same situation.
I found myself hoping that the day Chae-eun's efforts are recognized would come as soon as possible, so that Chae-eun, too, could live a life different from the one in the last world.
Chae-eun is the high-strung type. With the audition moved up, she'd be stressed enough already, so it seemed better to wrap up practice as quickly as possible and get her to sleep.
Fortunately, Chae-eun had read the whole 'Loner' script and sorted it with index stickers in all colors.
She couldn't have had much time, and I was proud of her. This is Chae-eun, who did method acting even as a bit part without a single line or one scrap of backstory. I had a good feeling this time, too.
"You've done all the analysis, huh? How was it?"
"I'm doomed. I have no idea at all what Yi-jin is feeling."
This was nowhere in my expectations.
***
Chae-eun, who'd finished script practice and gotten a little sleep toward dawn, fortunately looked to be in fine condition.
The one who'd stayed up the whole night through was me. While Chae-eun slept, I went to a supermarket that was open before dawn and bought things to give her grandmother.
Because Mom had been in the hospital's care for so long, I was able to quickly pick out the kind of things a grandmother with limited mobility would need, like a cushion, socks, and soy milk that's easy to drink.
And then I'd gathered up Chae-eun, who'd woken from her nap, and we'd just arrived, in good time, at the office of Redbox Studio, which is co-producing 'Loner' with KBC.
Stares at Chae-eun, who had suddenly become a celebrity, flew in from every direction and stuck. The impact of the Chae-eun articles, which had gone beyond the entertainment pages and taken over the general news pages as well, was more than I'd hoped for.
"Chae-eun, you're here? The audition before yours hasn't finished yet. Please have a seat and wait a little."
The youngest PD at the production company's office, who recognized us though we hadn't given our names, showed us where to sit.
Chae-eun only tipped her head, a perfunctory greeting. It was the same Chae-eun who'd put up a wall in the taxi on the way to the one-act drama set, telling me not to disturb her.
"Hello, I'm Lee San-woo from Yong Entertainment. Chae-eun, shall we say hello together?"
When I laid a hand lightly on Chae-eun's back, her body gave a startled jump.
"Ah? Ah! Yes. Hello."
Chae-eun bowed her head deeply in greeting, then looked around the office with eyes that had come into focus.
She seemed to have been completely submerged in the script. When I sat Chae-eun down and signaled with my eyes for her to rest a moment, the look in her eyes sank back down.
My image is Chae-eun's image. Before people could get the wrong idea about Chae-eun, I flashed a smile carrying 1 point's worth of Affinity and handed over my business card.
"Here's my card. I hope we'll be seeing each other often."
"Ah. Yes...."
I saw the youngest PD's face stiffen slightly.
Are my stats still not enough? A manager's job involves a lot of work that requires winning people's hearts. It would be nice if the Affinity stat got points piled into it. I greeted the person sitting next to us as well.
"Hello, I'm Lee San-woo, the manager in charge of Chae-eun."
"I'm Jo Min-ju. Imagine meeting a celebrity here."
When I handed over my card, which read Yong Entertainment Manager, a subtly sarcastic tone came back. The card I received in return read Sinsa Entertainment. Noh Jeong-ah's agency.
"You're the one who was doing the chest compressions during the CPR, I believe."
From the way she'd looked past Chae-eun, who'd stood up front and given the interview, and remembered even my figure from the blurry CCTV, she had a remarkably sharp eye.
"That's right. I was out shopping with Chae-eun, you see."
"There's no rank on your card? A new hire?"
"Yes. I joined not long ago."
"You joined not long ago, and yet your PR skills are really good. The articles made it look as if Chae-eun did the good deed all on her own, after all. Not that I wouldn't have steered all the credit to my actor too."
From the way she went out of her way to pinpoint a fact everyone knew, she didn't seem to like that Chae-eun had become famous overnight. The way she whittled down Chae-eun's credit while pretending to compliment me was smooth.
"So Noh Jeong-ah is auditioning too? She's famous, so that's unexpected."
I knew Noh Jeong-ah had been pre-selected, but I probed on purpose. At an audition, Noh Jeong-ah and Chae-eun are in the same boat. Momentum mattered.
"Does fame alone get it done? Ability matters most. Jeong-ah has plenty of offers coming in, but she came because this work's script is just that good. Jeong-ah likes this role so much."
"I see. So do we. It's a role exactly to Chae-eun's taste."
"Plenty of offers coming in, you say. I didn't know."
Of course she didn't know. There aren't any.
Jo Min-ju stole a glance at Chae-eun, who sat leaning against the wall with her eyes closed. When Jo Min-ju noted the clean script in Chae-eun's hand, the corners of her mouth curled up crookedly.
But there was something Jo Min-ju, looking down on Chae-eun, didn't know.
Last night, Chae-eun and I had a long talk about the character, and Chae-eun, just as I'd said, put in a new emotion and re-created the character. Chae-eun had fallen asleep shouting 'This one is mine, no matter what'.
And today, Chae-eun had swapped her own tattered script for the one I'd been carrying and walked into the audition venue. Down to her act as a prim little thing pretending to be a natural, Chae-eun was perfectly prepared.
Writer Son Yu-rim's first full-length series, 'Loner', is a thriller melodrama.
Yun-yeong, the poor female lead who married a man from a chaebol family for love alone, learns of the existence of a mistress after her husband dies in an accident.
Yun-yeong ends up taking in and raising the son who'd been in the womb of the mistress, at full term when she died along with the husband.
Having decided to remain a daughter-in-law of the chaebol family, Yun-yeong embraces that child as her own son and struggles to be accepted by the family, but she is always a loner.
When the child starts elementary school, Yun-yeong enters graduate school and begins the outside activities she'd been cut off from, and there she meets the male lead, Il-ju, a poor graduate student, and comes to nurture feelings of love.
The role Chae-eun will audition for is Yi-jin, the half-sister, by a different mother, of Yun-yeong's dead husband.
Yi-jin, who grew up trusting and leaning on Yun-yeong, comes to crave a mother's love from her, and as she nurtures possessiveness and a desire to control Yun-yeong as well, she ends up jealous of Il-ju, showing a many-sided character.
"Then I'll be waiting for good news."
The parting words carried through the open door, and Noh Jeong-ah came out of the audition room.
"Jeong-ah! Did it go well?"
"I just did it. Why?"
Jo Min-ju draped a coat over Noh Jeong-ah, who was out of sorts somehow, and studied her face.
"If you just did it, that's enough, since this is a formality anyway."
Noh Jeong-ah shrugged off the coat Jo Min-ju had draped over her with a flick. The coat dropped to the floor in a heap.
Wow, the manners.
"So why do I have to do something that's just a formality? A manager can't even sort out one thing like this? With my career, why do I have to audition for a work like this, being treated as on the same level as kids like that? It's so annoying."
A work like this, kids like that. When Noh Jeong-ah, having sniped everyone in range with a single sentence, went outside, Jo Min-ju picked up the fallen coat and followed her out.
You sure have it rough, too.
When I shook my head and turned around, the youngest PD, flustered at having witnessed something she shouldn't have, quietly announced the next turn.
"Chae-eun, you may go in."
"May I go in with her?"
When I asked in a gentle voice, the youngest PD, her face for some reason even more flustered, stammered.
"Uh, uh.... I'll ask."
"Tell him to wait outside!"
Writer Son Yu-rim's booming voice flowed out from inside the open door. So the door happened to be open. Noh Jeong-ah, thank you.
When Chae-eun went into the room and closed the door behind her, I slipped my foot in and kept it from closing all the way. In front of the door behind which Chae-eun was auditioning, I listened closely to what was happening inside.
Hum, hum— The sound droning inside the room came through more and more clearly.
Unnie, just hold on and wait a little longer. Once I graduate, let's live together. Who was it that helped you find your place in this family? I could feel Chae-eun's breathing change from moment to moment as she spoke the same lines.
From a desperate child to a chilling obsession, Chae-eun showed a range of emotions and finished her performance.
In the office, where a dead pause had opened for a moment, only the sound of water bottles being opened one after another rang out, and then Writer Son's voice followed.
"Chae-eun. A lot of parts feel different from the stage directions in the script, don't they? What emotion were you acting with?"
"I put romance into the way she looks at Yun-yeong."
Writer Son slowly asked in return.
"Why would that be?"
"Yi-jin was born out of wedlock, you see. Half an outsider, Yi-jin would have felt a strong kinship with her sister-in-law. She would have poured into her all the immature feelings that should have gone to her own mother. But when Yun-yeong tries to climb over the fence and go to another man, I thought there would be some emotion exploding inside her."
"So you put in romance? Why romance?"
"Yi-jin shuts out even the nephew Yun-yeong has raised. Only when it's just her and Yun-yeong is she not a loner, because when it's three of them, or when she's alone, she becomes a loner. I thought the possessiveness of wanting to cut off the people around Yun-yeong and have her all to herself resembled a twisted form of love."
Sharp as a tack. Chae-eun.
"Did you catch that from the script on your own, Chae-eun? The script I gave you didn't contain all of that."
"I practiced the script with my manager oppa."
"Yong Entertainment, is it? Who's the manager?"
The production company PD's voice carried out to me.
"Lee San-woo. Tell him to come in!"
It was the booming voice of Writer Son that I'd been waiting for.
When I strode into the room, Writer Son saw my face and let out a hollow laugh, hah.
"Fuck, I really can't do this job anymore."
Writer Son set the pen she'd been holding down on the desk, all but throwing it.
Roll, roll, roll.
Watching the pen roll away, I gulped.