Chapter 132

She was clinging tightly.

There was no better phrase to express Ha Eun’s current state.

Overall, her face was enveloped in a reddish hue.

Her forehead was rubbing right below Maria’s chest.

Two arms were tightly wrapped around her soft waist.

Interlocked hands behind Maria’s back prevented her from escaping.

And.

“I really, really liked you, Cream… Because I liked you, we used to talk frequently…”

Whispered words that had started bubbling up from somewhere.

“Since that day… You never called first… Why are you keeping your distance…?”

Amazed by Ha Eun’s appearance, which was 180 degrees different from her usual self, Maria sought help from the other members and Jee Hye-min.

However, everyone else was just watching with excited expressions.

Even Jee Hye-min had somehow started filming with her phone.

“It seems like Maria has a lot to feel sorry about. Let’s hear her out~.”

Jee Hye-min’s remark indicated she had no intention of intervening right now.

The other members were rustling through a snack bag, as if they had discovered something interesting, ‘snacking on popcorn.’

Thus, realizing she had to resolve the situation on her own, Maria gently patted Ha Eun’s back.

It reminded her of a time long ago when she had comforted her younger cousin.

“Umm… What could have made our Ha Eun feel this way…?”

An awkward voice.

Yet, with her reasoning already shut down, Ha Eun let out words she had deeply bottled up.

“Everything, all of it…! I made mistakes, apologized, and I said it was okay… Shouldn’t we go back to how things were…? Why didn’t you call…?”

Ha Eun’s voice was trembling slightly.

Maria, feeling another wave of confusion, didn’t offer any help this time.

In the end, only gentle pats on Ha Eun’s back and words like “I’m sorry, sis,” or “I see, you must have felt hurt because I didn’t call” were repeated.

It was true that since the incident with Diah’s real voice, Maria had been careful when calling Ha Eun.

It seemed that this change in Maria’s attitude had been stepping on Ha Eun’s toes for a while now.

For quite some time, Ha Eun continued her not-so-soliloquy.

With Maria firmly held, she could do little more than respond to Ha Eun’s mumbling and wait for her to calm down.

As time passed, slowly, Ha Eun’s head rose from resting on Maria’s chest to settle on her shoulder.

Then came another mumble.

“Cream… You don’t hate me, right…?”

In a voice that seemed to whisper into Maria’s ears, Maria nodded and assured her that she had no reason to hate Ha Eun.

Almost simultaneously came a relieved voice.

“Hehe, thank goodness… At least you don’t hate me…”

At that moment, Maria thought Ha Eun had calmed down.

She believed Ha Eun would loosen her grip around her.

But.

Despite that.

“Then, can’t you just say you love me…? Just once, I’d be happy…”

Ha Eun’s head lifted slowly from Maria’s shoulder and faced her directly, making another request.

Given this request, Maria was understandably startled.

After all, all she sensed from Ha Eun’s face was pure sincerity.

“Pfft.”

“Tipsy Ha Eun is full of charm. Maria is lucky~!”

The other members watched Ha Eun and Maria with expressions of amusement.

Jee Hye-min’s phone remained busy capturing Ha Eun’s intoxicated visage.

At that moment, as Maria slightly turned her head away from Ha Eun, glaring with a tight-lipped expression at the others,

-Tok.

-Tok. Tok.

“…Huh?”

Something warm began to fall onto Maria’s thigh.

Simultaneously, a sobbing voice reached her ears.

“Please… Just once. Just once would be fine…!”

The beautiful face now appeared before Maria once again, looking precarious for a moment.

As if it would collapse at the slightest touch.

Two streams of tears were now running down Ha Eun’s fragile-looking face.

Her once-red eyes were now strikingly void of any emotion for reasons unknown.

“I… I love you. Our Ha Eun, I love you so much!”

In a fleeting moment of disbelief at her own eyes, Maria hurriedly granted Ha Eun’s request.

Just seconds later, a quiet laughter followed.

“…Ha, haha.”

However, everyone except Ha Eun sensed something was off, causing their laughter to fade.

Jee Hye-min’s phone also gradually pointed downward.

“Such simple words… And I couldn’t say them…”

Her head hung low.

Her hair drooped.

Shoulders shaking.

Tears streaming down.

“Because I couldn’t say it just once. What is so… Hard… about it… damn…”

At first, Maria thought it was definitely an act.

But no matter how she thought, it was not.

If this very moment was also an act, then nobody could discern Ha Eun’s truths or lies.

“Ugh, Ahh…”

She was in true pain.

Those once-familiar yet now unfamiliar bitter feelings filled the room with their heart-wrenching cries until she succumbed to exhaustion and fell asleep.

Finally, after Ha Eun unceremoniously collapsed into a deep slumber, others besides Maria began to show signs of panic.

“Wh-What should we do? What do we do, representative?”

“First… Let’s move Ha Eun to a bed.”

Thus, after moving Ha Eun, who was sprawled on the floor, to the hotel’s bed, the remaining members gathered again to speculate about the circumstances Ha Eun had been hiding.

The conclusion reached was:

“Before we leave tomorrow, we’ll make a space for you. Maria should talk to Ha Eun alone.”

“Me? I should?”

“I’ve been thinking it over, and I believe it’s better for you than for me.”

For some reason, it seemed Maria was the preferred choice.

Jee Hye-min’s words were nodded in agreement by everyone except Maria.

However, Ha Eun, in the end, could not remember what words or actions she had taken at all.

For the simple reason that.

“Ugh…”

She had to wake up earlier than anyone else as usual and must face the hangover.

Her head was ringing, and it seemed that it would not clear up anytime soon.

The only thing she could recall was the color of the can she had drunk the night before.

Therefore, to figure out the cause of this unknown pain, she headed towards the stack of empty cans piled on the hotel table.

Moments later, she found a can that matched her hazy memories.

-Thud.

“…This is bad.”

She realized the reason her memories were completely gone was because it was her first time drinking alcohol and sat down on the floor.

The events that Jee Hye-min had mentioned about the potential consequences of Ha Eun drinking filled her mind.

Of course, neither Jee Hye-min nor the members of the Fanta-Hyang would do anything with the fact that Ha Eun had drunk.

But the ominous feeling that tipsy Ha Eun must have caused a scene was rising.

Several hours later, during shopping in Akihabara, she kept glancing at others because of this.

However, for some reason.

“Ha, Ha Eun. Aren’t you going to buy this? You said you’d definitely get this no matter what.”

The voices, noticeably awkward compared to the previous day, made Ha Eun feel even more uneasy.

Her mind was already in disarray.

Of course, she did as much shopping for subculture goods as she wanted.

She even brought an extra suitcase specifically for this moment.

“Can you really take all of those back to Korea? I don’t think you’ll fit them all.”

“It’s okay. This time, I brought an extra suitcase for the merchandise.”

“For… merchandise?”

“Yeah.”

“Is it wholesale?”

***

In conclusion, the third day of the travel vlog ended up having a noticeably lower energy than previous days.

Not only was the fatigue from the trip overwhelming, but also the unexpected incident from last night prevented her from raising her energy.

“Well then, see you in Korea. Bye…”

With that, it ended abruptly.

At the moment Ha Eun and the others’ shadows arrived right in front of the Japanese airport, the vlog filming concluded.

Then came Jee Hye-min’s signal.

“I’ll look into some things at the airport, so when I call, everyone come inside the airport then.”

Right after that, the group, excluding Maria, began to disperse quickly.

Park Mi-soo and Kim Eun-hye hurried off saying they needed the restroom, while Lee Ye-na dashed towards a nearby convenience store.

As a result, the only one left by Ha Eun’s side was Maria.

Ha Eun was understandably surprised by this abrupt unfolding of events.

However, far more startled was she when Maria took her hand and pulled her into the café, saying she had something personal to discuss.

Once they reached the café table, Maria had a truly serious expression on her face.

“Hey, Ha Eun… Is something wrong?”

A very worried look.

But despite going over her memories repeatedly, Ha Eun could find no significant event or issue.

“No?”

“I won’t say anything to anyone, so just tell me.”

“…There’s really nothing wrong…”

A heavy silence ensued.

Maria naturally began paying close attention to her surroundings.

But then what came from Maria’s mouth shortly after was truly odd.

“Do you not get along with your parents…?”

“??”

Ha Eun widened her eyes, instinctively questioning what she meant as she looked back at Maria.

It was then that she learned about last night’s incidents.

“Ha Eun, you really cried sadly.”

“Me? I did?”

“Yeah.”

The conversation that followed revealed that Jee Hye-min and the other members were also concerned about Ha Eun.

They had all asked Maria to please let Ha Eun know if there was anything they could help with.

However, for Ha Eun, her drunken weeping was nothing but a dark history.

In the first place, issues concerning her parents from the past were not something Maria or anyone else could assist with.

Therefore, she worried about how to resolve this awkward atmosphere.

Yet despite her efforts, no sharp solution emerged.

In the end, she had to make up excuses.

Enough to catch someone who knew Ha Eun from school off guard.

“Uhm, well… So… I have a great relationship with my parents…”

“Then why were you crying?”

“Um, um… It’s because of my boyfriend.”

“My… boyfriend? Ha Eun, you had a boyfriend?!”

In a flash, Maria sprang up from her seat, drawing everyone’s attention to her and Ha Eun.

After a bit of calming down, Maria reseated herself while Ha Eun continued on with her excuses.

“I really liked him a lot, but he didn’t pay any attention to me and ended up cheating on me.”

That moment, creating a nonexistent boyfriend, led to the roughest word hearing from Maria.

“That’s an awful bastard.”

“Um, well. He wasn’t really a nice guy, was he?”

“A complete scumbag! How could he cheat when he has our Ha Eun there!”

For some reason, she appeared angrier than Ha Eun herself.

For around 30 minutes, all kinds of curses rained down on Ha Eun’s imaginary boyfriend.

Of course, Maria’s words were aimed at comforting Ha Eun.

And secretly, she was relieved it wasn’t a problem related to the family environment she had imagined.

Ha Eun was also calmed down, perfectly deceiving Maria’s eyes.

Ha Eun didn’t wish for her real parents to be misunderstood.

Jee Hye-min called all the members of Fanta-Hyang afterward.

Thanks to the messages Maria had sent, she had an idea of what was going on — from start to finish, all lies — and hugged Ha Eun tightly.

Then, she leaned close to Ha Eun’s ear.

“Don’t suffer alone; if you can talk to me about what’s on your mind, do it. I will always be on Ha Eun’s side.”

She said that she would somehow resolve any problems or heartaches Ha Eun was facing.

Ha Eun could only respond with a vague smile and a thank you.

‘…Even those words mean a lot.’

At that moment, she thought just words would be sufficient.

She thought that her overflowing intentions to genuinely assist Ha Eun were enough.

But barely two weeks later, a rather staggering incident struck Ha Eun.

“Da-yeon.”

“What?”

“Still, it’s the acting awards.”

Isn’t the virtual YouTuber keychain a little inappropriate for a handbag?

To Ha Eun’s carefully delivered worry, the response was unfortunately one of dismissive reassurance.

“It’s cute. Who cares?”

“It’s not that it’s not cute. What if there’s an issue when the media takes pictures?”

“I’ll handle it.”

“…Okay…”

Thus, Da-yeon wandered off far away.

With a beautiful dress and a rather expensive designer handbag for the upcoming KBC acting awards in just a few hours, that was the moment.

The problem was that Diah’s keychain was hanging off the edge of that designer handbag.

It was a larger issue that Da-yeon’s handbag would surely be captured in photos when she stood on the photo line of the KBC acting awards.

Nonetheless, there was no capability within the current Ha Eun to solve such issues.

After all, actor Lee Ha-eun was someone completely unrelated to virtual YouTuber Diah.

Even pretending to recognize Diah’s keychain was a difficult task.

‘This is driving me crazy indeed…’

Time passed, and finally, with less than two hours until the KBC acting award’s live broadcast, Ha Eun’s distress hadn’t subsided.

“…Ugh…”

Was that it?

“…What’s wrong?”

From beside her, Yu Sung-jae, who had gotten into the car, spoke with a tinge of concern.

However, they had to enter the KBC acting awards as the two main characters of [The Moonlight Parted by Clouds] in mere seconds.

“No… It’s nothing…”

Feeling instinctively that mentioning Da-yeon was futile, she sensed it was water under the bridge, and the bus had already departed.

She figured that even if she told Yu Sung-jae about Diah, he wouldn’t understand.

Anyway, it was almost time for them to truly enter the events of the KBC acting awards.

-Squeak.

At last, stepping out of the stopped limousine, she linked arms with Yu Sung-jae, the male lead of [The Moonlight Parted by Clouds].

Simultaneously, the camera shutters poured in.

-Click!

-Click click!

The camera flashes, alternating between Yu Sung-jae’s suit and Ha Eun’s dress, almost blinded her.

Looking back, the reason she had put on a high-level makeup and a beautiful dress was precisely to be captured by those cameras.

“Take it slow; just be careful not to trip.”

“…Yes.”

As they began walking the red carpet in synchrony with Yu Sung-jae’s slow steps, the incessant sound of camera shutters continued.

The idea that Diah’s keychain had been captured among those countless cameras sent shivers from her head to her toes.

“…Haah…”

“…Was my pace too slow?”

“It’s not because of you, Sung-jae; it’s true.”

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