leonardwarren Chapter 430: Goodbye and Promise (5)
Chapter 430: Goodbye and Promise (5)
Chapter 430: Goodbye and Promise (5)
"Thanks for your hard work, everyone. Great job, Eden."
After the first rehearsal for Eden's concert, Reina patted my shoulder and left the practice room for her schedule. Goh Yoo-Joon stood up with the camera in his hand and approached me.
"Good job, Hyun-Woo." It had been almost five hours of practice, and Goh Yoo-Joon's voice sounded more exhausted than in the morning.
"Oh, you too, manager."
"Let's go home now. Let's go!"
"Good work!"
"Thank you!"
I stood up, following Goh Yoo-Joon's lead. We headed outside as I heard the loud cheers of the staff.
"Eden's schedule is all done now, everyone. We’re going to go eat. Hyun-Woo, is there anything you want to eat?"
"Who's paying?"
"Right! It's like I’m paying, but with a company card."
"Then let's eat something expensive."
"Yeah, expensive sounds good."
The content with Goh Yoo-Joon as my daily manager lacked footage despite being filmed for a long time because it only involved him sitting and filming me practicing while singing. I couldn't reveal this footage because it was a spoiler.
Even if at first Goh Yoo-Joon's commentary filled the time by praising me for my hard work, five hours of filming the same thing would be boring for the viewers. That was why Su-Hwan had handed him the card and told him to film more, even if it was just us eating.
After we got in the car, Goh Yoo-Joon asked, "What do you want to eat?"
"Hmm, something that's not meat."
"Why? Meat is always good, though. I like it."
I shook my head with disgust. "Let's eat something light, at least when Jin-Sung is not around."
"Well, okay. Oh, I know a place. It's specialized in finger food, want to go?"
Even though he just asked me this, Goh Yoo-Joon was already driving toward the destination. It had to be a place where he had arranged for filming in advance.
"There's a place specialized in finger food?"
"Yeah, the quality of food there is really good. They also serve simple alcoholic drinks."
"...You want to drink?"
Goh Yoo-Joon nodded and looked at me. It was a question of whether it was okay. I shrugged without a word. I mean, he was very lightweight. Neither the Elated nor Chronos version of us handled alcohol well. Among our members, only Elated Yoon-Chan was good at drinking.
When I gave Goh Yoo-Joon a skeptical look, he seemed to quickly catch on to my thoughts and smiled sheepishly. "I didn't mean we’d drink seriously, just casually have some cocktails and champagne."
"That sounds good." I turned off the camera that Goh Yoo-Joon handed to me.
Goh Yoo-Joon glanced at me and then asked, "Today was your first time practicing alone. How was it?"
"Wow, everyone! Look at this. Isn't the presentation amazing? It tastes incredible." Goh Yoo-Joon praised the food while filming it, then hesitated before firmly saying to the camera, "This is definitely not an advertisement. Hehe."
Though Goh Yoo-Joon exaggerated his praise to perhaps lessen the awkwardness, the food that arrived was really beautiful. They were three types of well-prepared dishes you’d see at a house party.
Even I, who usually wasn't greedy for food, became curious about how they tasted.
"Bon appetit!"
We briefly described the taste of the dishes we ate and refilled our conversation with thoughts that came up in the meantime.
A little while later, Goh Yoo-Joon fiddled with the camera. "We’re going to turn off the camera now and enjoy our meal! Bye!" He signaled for me to wave at the camera too.
"Bye! See you later!"
I guess this was what being an idol for nearly ten years was about. He probably thought we had filmed enough content by now. Goh Yoo-Joon turned off the camera and exhaled deeply before whispering. "Let's eat normally now."
"Hey, if you say that, the Rings might feel upset."
"Rings...? Ah, the Chronos fans."
...Ah, right. I knew that Elated's fans had a different name.
Goh Yoo-Joon glanced at me, seeming to realize something. "I’m sorry if that came off wrong."
"It's okay. Elated fans had a different name, so it's understandable."
"And about what I did when the camera was on today—"
Ah, again. Goh Yoo-Joon was the first to build walls. He was careful around me and apologized when he didn't need to. But all of his actions that were deferential to me were probably my fault.
"Wait a minute." I interrupted Goh Yoo-Joon. We couldn't resolve twisted conflicts like this.
We had finally gotten a good chance to talk, but it would be awkward if we just ate and then went back to the hotel.
Goh Yoo-Joon wouldn't have revived me just for our relationship to end up like this. I wasn’t going to apologize and lower my head to them for this either.
"Can't you just treat me normally?"
"What?" Goh Yoo-Joon looked confused and smiled faintly. "I’m treating you normally right now."
"If you are, then why are you trying to apologize when you’ve done nothing wrong?" I tried to keep the atmosphere light, almost jokingly. "We don't have much time left anyway. Didn't you want to talk more before?"
"...Because it's just the two of us, there's something I want to ask you."
Suddenly, Goh Yoo-Joon's voice became heavy. His gaze was desperate yet cautious, and it was filled with sadness. He looked at me earnestly. "Because Joo-Han hyung isn't here..."
"Why? Is there something you can't say in front of Joo-Han hyung?"
Goh Yoo-Joon looked around cautiously but nodded. Yeah, well, I was ready to listen to anything. Even if Goh Yoo-Joon expressed resentment about my actions back then, I could now handle it if we talked about it.
But then he said something I didn’t quite expect he would say.
"What would you think if I said I’m staying here?"