Friday | April 12th, 2024 | 6:11 PM
This week has been one of my best in a while, I can't lie. My conscience wasn’t bothering me about Ningning, which was a plus. My head has been more clear since my deep talk with Haerin which has made focusing on school feel much easier. And Chaewon has just been the sweetest girlfriend lately, we've even had study sessions over the phone, which granted me some nice brownie points with her.
Haerin's advice and the conversation with her overall stuck with me. It wasn't a direct cure-all, more of a quiet hum in the back of my mind, a gentle reminder of the person I wanted to be for someone who believed in me. I found myself actually trying to focus in class, the concepts starting to click into place the more I paid attention. The guilt over my grades was lessening which I guess in turn lessened some of the guilt I carried for my argument with Chaewon too. Life was feeling... easier. Stable.
I even made it a point to hang out and study with Haerin and the others after letting myself be a ghost for so long. Even if hanging out meant sitting at a table for hours in occasional silence while I did my schoolwork. Speaking of which, the occasional silence was broken when Hanni threw a balled-up napkin at my forehead, making me lose my place.
"Speaking to you, space cadet," she grinned as she sat across from me. Next to her, Haerin was quietly tracing a page of her textbook with the back of her pen, not looking at anyone but her mind was clearly there listening in with the small upturning corner of her lips.
"I'm trying to graduate, you should try it," I threw the napkin back at her. She yelped, ducking her head as the napkin flew behind and onto the floor. Danielle chimed in with a small giggle from the side of me where she tapped her fingers against the trackpad of her laptop. We were, of course, in our usual place on the second floor of the campus library.
"Sorry for trying to bring you back to Earth." Hanni leaned forward onto the table, her chin propped on her hands. "You weren't answering my question." Her long hair brushed against the open pages of her textbook. "It's important. My GPA depends on your response."
Haerin chuckled, "You were asking him what he did last night," she added, the words coming out as more of an observation. She hadn't looked up from her book, her long hair shielding her face.
I rolled my eyes and dropped them back into the binder open in front of me. "Yesterday was Thursday. I work on Tuesday and Thursday, Hanni," I retorted, my voice monotone.
"Ah," Hanni drew out the syllable, a smirk in her voice. "Right, you're right. I forgot." Her eyes, sharp and playful, darted from my face to Haerin's and then over to Danielle. Something unspoken passed between them. Well, more one-sided than one of them would like. I could feel it like a change in air pressure.
Danielle, ever the peacemaker, picked up on the tension and defused it with a bright, sunny smile. "Leave him alone, Hanni. Can't you see he's in the zone?" she reached across the table, grabbing one of my pens and scribbling a crude but funny doodle on my notepad. A smiling stick figure with scribbles for messy hair.
"He's always in the zone," Hanni shrugged, not taking her eyes off me as she leaned forward on her elbows. "He's starting to look like the robot." The robot, in question, was referring to Haerin, who was still too busy studying to contribute her input, besides the faint smile on her lips remained a fixed and permanent line across her face.
A couple minutes passed by, a few pages were flipped. A few quiet coughs. The rustle of papers and the soft clicks from Danielle's laptop. I thought the conversation had ended, but then Hanni's quiet sigh made me look up. She was staring up at the ceiling, looking bored.
"I'm hungry," She announced after her little yawn.
"You're always hungry," I commented, making a note in my binder.
"What's that supposed to mean," Hanni sat up from her previous lazy position, a smile growing on her face as she tried to press me. "Are you calling me fat?"
Danielle came in hot. "Just a little squishy, in a good way," She giggled, leaning over the table to pinch Hanni's cheek. That little gesture sent Hanni's face into a deep blush. She didn't flinch away, she only let her get away with it.
"Aish," Hanni swatted Danielle's hand away but not too hard, "This is bullying, the three of you against one." Her smile remained, though, a wide, happy thing.
"Three?" Haerin spoke up, her head finally lifting, her cat-like eyes wide with innocence. "I didn't say anything."
Hanni leaned over and hugged the other girl, "You're right. I'm sorry, my dear. I meant the two jerks across from us." The foreign girl started coddling and petting Haerin's hair, whispering more sweet apologies into her ear like Haerin was a cat she was trying to calm. Haerin accepted the affection, melting into it with a quiet hum.
I looked back down. Okay.
"C'mon, let's get something to eat," Hanni said, pulling away from a content Haerin. "What else is a Friday afternoon for?"
"Final exams," Haerin quietly corrected her, the smile in her voice giving her away.
"Not you, you drink oil," Hanni pointed back and Haerin's eyes narrowed in playful offense.
"I'm down," Danielle agreed, her arms crossed onto the table. "C'mon, Minjae, let's go." She looked at me, expectantly.
"I can't," I said, tapping the page I was on with the back of my pen. "I am going to be like Haerin and drink oil. I gotta pass."
"Studying is a mental exercise, Minjae. You can't overwork yourself," Hanni said dramatically. Her gaze lingered on me. "You've got to feed the brain and soul with good food. It's the rules of science."
I couldn't help the small laugh that escaped. "Is that what they're teaching these days?" I shot back, my gaze finally lifting from my notes to meet hers.
Danielle ripped my attention as she threw her two cents in, "You've been stuck on the same chapter for the past ten minutes anyways. You're starting to slow down, get some grub in you." she said, pointing at my textbook. She wasn't wrong. My brain was hitting a wall. The words on the page were starting to blur into meaningless shapes.
"You've been doing more of watching me study than you do studying yourself," I fired back.
"Got to supervise my favorite study groupie," she winked. The wink was subtle and fast, an action that would go unnoticed by the two other girls with me. I could see that teasing glint in her eyes, that playful demeanor that comes and goes so I could never get used to it. It always blindsided me whenever I least expected it. That flirty energy she gave off without any commitment was a whole other kind of confusing.
"Right," I coughed, turning back to my book, the text starting to blur. But I had a promise to keep.
Hanni kicked my leg under the table gently. "Stop it. We're getting food. All of us." She shoulder bumped Haerin, "Even you, I was kidding about the oil thing."
"I could eat," Haerin agreed with a shy smile.
"See? Decision's made," Hanni declared, looking back at me, "If Haerin, the study-bot, is hungry, we have to eat."
My eyes drifted back to Haerin again. She smiled at me for a second, her cat-like eyes catching the late afternoon sun streaming through the campus library windows. "If Minjae wants to study more, we can leave him," she said. She offered me a little half shrug, a look that said 'you have a way out of this.'
"Hmm, we can hit that burger joint near the quad. Or that pasta place in the Student Center that Hanni likes," Danielle was thinking out loud.
"A burger does sound nice," Hanni mused. Haerin seemed to not care what the choice was.
"Wait," Danielle stopped herself, turning her phone towards Hanni. "The art department gallery is having their free donut and coffee reception right now."
A collective 'oooo' went around the table, a shared understanding. Free food was holy. It was the currency of college life.
"C'mon, we have to go now. The good ones will go fast," Danielle said. I was starting to get swept up in the current with them but my phone vibrated in my pocket. Just one quick buzz. I fished it out. A text from Chaewon:
Chaewon
ughhh class was so tiring today
And there we go, my warning to not go for that little worm on the hook.
I looked back up at the group. Well actually, my eyes fell onto Haerin. She wasn't paying attention, looking to study the last few lines in her textbook before she left. Free food was promising, but I can't disappoint both Chaewon and Haerin. "I'll have to sit this one out guys." I tried to hide a sigh in my voice and not in my face.
"What?" Danielle sounded like I'd just said I was dropping out of school. "Free donuts, Minjae!" She lunged forward, both her hands planted onto my upper thigh as she pleaded, a movement both sudden and so close that I could smell her perfume. Something sweet and fruity. Then her hands started to squeeze. Just once.
The position was a bit too intimate for me. Her eyes looked up at me from under her bangs, big and pleading with screaming alarms of more than just friendly teasing. The way she leaned put her whole front on display as a gift for my eyes.
"U-uh," my words caught in my throat. "I'm not that hungry for a donut I guess," I replied. Her hands were still there, an unwelcome but not entirely unpleasant pressure. Out of my peripheral vision, I noticed Hanni shift slightly away, her posture becoming rigid as she looked straight at us. I cleared my throat, "Also... Chaewon would kill me if I stopped studying," I finally replied, lifting my phone as my excuse.
"Ugh," was all Danielle said as she removed her hands at once. The contact was gone and I could breathe again. I risked a glance over towards Hanni, and for the slightest second, she gave Danielle a look. A look that read completely of unguarded, pure daggers of irritation. It was fast and fleeting, replaced a millisecond later with that charming, bright smile.
"Suit yourself. More free stuff for us," Hanni shrugged, turning back to Haerin and Danielle. The three of them started to get up from their seats, "Watch our stuff, will you Minjae?" Hanni asked casually.
"Of course," I promised, looking at the three girls. Haerin lingered for a half-step behind them as the duo started walking off. She had turned back to me. I expected her to just follow after them, but she paused.
"I'll bring you back something," she offered kindly, just to me.
I smiled. "You don't have to. Go get your free stuff."
"Glazed or chocolate?" she asked.
I smiled at her, "Glazed."
She smiled back, "Okay." With that, she spun around, catching up to the girls at the end of the floor, and disappeared around the corner.
And now it was just me and this binder that started to become less friendly. Except my phone buzzed again.
Chaewon
what r u doing rn?
It was followed by a casual selfie of her outdoors, presumably walking back to her dorm from class. Her cheeks looked flushed, a few stray strands of hair blowing across her face in the breeze. My thumb hovered over the keyboard.
nothing much. just skipped out on donuts w the group to study more
To prove my point, I snapped a picture of the empty table full of our bags, with my textbook propped open. For show. I sent the photo and watched the three little dots appear and disappear as she typed.
Chaewon
that's gooddd
sucks abt the donuts tho lol
haha yeah
its okay, haerin said she'll pick something up for me
Chaewon
thats kind of her
i should get back and study too
good luck w your study sessss
you too :)
see you tmrw
Chaewonsee you tomorrow :P
The conversation ended as quickly as it began. I let out a breath I didn't realize I was holding. The silence at the table was back, a stark contrast to the noise the girls left behind. I rubbed at my temples, the ghost of a headache forming. I can't say for certain where we stood with each other.
I mean, yeah, at surface level, it's just a normal checkup between us. We've had these types of short conversations for months now, but after the argument, it hasn't felt right to me. I could be blowing this out of my ass. My overthinking. I could only be certain over a phone call. I can always tell with her voice, but words on a screen, I'm out of luck.
The library hummed with a quiet energy. The rustle of turning pages, the distant cough, the soft clack of keyboards. In their absence, the library felt bigger, emptier. I wasn't focusing as much as I pretended to. My thoughts were a jumbled mess. I kept staring at the door, expecting them to walk back in any second.
I moved my view over at the table around me. Danielle’s bag slouched lazily over the back of her chair. Her laptop was open to a word document, the cursor blinking at the top of an empty page. A page full of nothing. A page as empty as my mind right now. Huh, that's weird.
The longer I stared at the laptop, I couldn't place my finger on what was wrong until I saw words appearing on the document. My mind started typing words of its own.
Her laptop is on and unlocked.
My eyes widened with a sudden, manic sense of clarity. My brain started to do that thing again. A little gift of a thought. Free reign into Danielle's private life.
I looked at the document as more words formed into a question. What are you looking for? What am I looking for?
Well, anything. Everything and anything is linked to everything. A little scroll, a simple search. Her social media, her browser history. Hell, if she was truly connected, her photos and messages might just be sitting in there, just waiting for me to uncover them. My gaze scanned the floor. Then my head swiveled around, casing the rest of the library floor we were on. No one was paying attention to me.
My eyes darted back to my textbook. The sentences were meaningless blurs, swimming across the page like tiny black fish. I couldn't absorb anything. Not when I'm already starting to feel an itch under my skin, that familiar restlessness. The promise. The studying. The trying. That's what I should be focusing on.
Instead, it felt like there were car keys jingling next to my ear, teasing me to break into the unoccupied vehicle with the unlocked doors sitting right next to me.
My head was starting to get fussy now. Just open it, see what she's been hiding, this little joyful fairy, and what kind of little secrets are in her world. Maybe she doesn't hide them. Maybe this held the answers to why she gets under my skin, how she seems to know when and how to test my limits without breaking them. How one friendly, slightly overbearing touch on the thigh can short-circuit my entire nervous system.
There has to be something to it all.
With a deep sigh that did nothing to calm the frantic bird in my chest, I did what I had to do. I had to do what this constant mental noise was telling me. Slowly, with the caution of a bomb-disposal expert, I reached forward. I slid the laptop closer to me. The cursor was blinking. I let my fingers rest on the keyboard, my heart pounding a guilty rhythm against my ribs.
My hands found the trackpad. I made a mental note of the state Danielle left her laptop in. The empty document, the webpage, the tabs open. All details to leave things exactly as she would want them to be. My index finger tapped twice, the two clicks that brought up her main screen and exposed all her open apps.
Just for a second. I would tell my own overthinking mind I would only do it for a second and then get right back to my studies.
I clicked the icon for her web browser. A universe of a life flashed open before me. A dozen tabs. A university portal, an online shopping site full of pastel-colored clothes, a streaming service paused mid-episode. And there was the 'History' button. That was where the real stories are hidden.
However, I was wrong. Clean as a whistle. Or a whistle that someone took the care of meticulously polishing every single day. Her history from the past week was all casual, normal stuff I'd expect a young woman her age to search up. Homework, searching for the best milk tea places near the dorm, browser shopping for things she'd probably look at but would never have the willpower to buy.
I clicked off. A small spark of disappointment, hot and fleeting, shot through me. Although, this was very exciting as well. It felt like a treasure hunt rummaging through her laptop, knowing I'll hit dead ends only to hit gold at the last second.
Okay. Let's take this somewhere else.
My cursor, controlled by my own unsteady hand, drifted toward the photo application. The app opened up with a satisfying 'whoosh'. Geez, this woman's photo album was not as clean as her browser history. Wait, no, that's the wrong word. Messy, I mean messy. Her album, spanning over the past 7 years, was a large collection of scattered memories.
There were so many photos of her with family, her friends from her high school. Then her university friends, including Hanni and Haerin. There it was. Photos of them in what I presumed was their shared dorm room. It looked like it was decorated by them. Cute plushies were set up on a neat shelf. fairy lights.
I found myself lingering longer than I should've on their fun memories. Selfies on campus, candid shots of each other working or being studious together. They looked happy. Carefree. I admired the way Haerin's small look at the camera spelled what she was thinking in the moment.
There was something about the way she showed up in these pictures, never on purpose, always candid but it was never a bad angle or bad shot of her. She wasn't even centered but somehow she was always the main focus. Another swipe. A group photo this time, all of them squeezed together in someone’s room. It was messy, half-lit, the kind of picture you take just to remember it happened.
Jesus, I'm getting nowhere with this. I noticed a 'Recently Deleted' folder in the corner of her screen. The red bin icon seemed to glow with temptation. Maybe she thought she deleted things, not that they go in a folder for 30 days to be deleted permanently. Nope. Locked behind a password-protected wall.
Not only that, the 'Hidden' album was also under that same lock. Of course it was. Now we're back to our dead end again. My shoulders slumped. This is dumb. She's a perfectly normal 19-year-old girl with an online footprint that matches her bubbly, friendly persona. All this effort, this risk, for... nothing.
I carried on, opening up her 'Messages'. At first, I started reading through her recent text chains, seeing 'Happy Birthday' texts from her parents, friends, and classmates. Ah geez, I missed her birthday yesterday. That thought hit me like a small, sharp pang of guilt.
I stopped where I was. For a second, I saw Danielle as just another human who happily celebrated another year of living. There goes a line, right, violating another person’s privacy? A line I wasn't prepared to cross fully, at least not right now. It just made me feel... gross. I read the names of all the contacts and group chats she was a part of, deciding to leave it at that and not invade anymore than I should.
Such a beautiful opportunity, but Danielle had nothing to hide. I found her 'Notes' app, lists of things to do, a snippet of a story she started, the most attention-seeking one reading '100 reasons why I think Hanni is the best roommate' which I assumed must've been sparked from a random night between Danielle and Hanni.
My mind went blank. I was ready to close the laptop but I opened a note that had blocks of text. Well, correction, it was emails and passwords with websites or accounts they went along with. This was the gold I was looking for. The skeleton key to Danielle's entire online life.
As a computer science major, it hurt some part of my heart to see Danielle reuse the same one password for every single thing in her life. It was the same password, with some numerical or symbol change for a few of them, but basically the same one.
'dani041105marsh'
And to use your birthday. Aish. In just moments and a lucky discovery, I now had access to every account she's had since she was a teenager. I was God. So what the hell do I do now?
I mean, I could try her photo albums again. If they were the passwords to all her accounts, her laptop should be no exception. Without another thought, I copied the password, returned to the locked photo album and typed it in.
The red lock icon spun and with a satisfying click, it opened.
Jackpot.
The very first photo in her 'Hidden' album hit me like a freight train. It was a selfie. And not just any selfie. A selfie of her. Completely topless, sitting up in her bed, her hair a mess and her cheeks rosy with sleep. The duvet was pooled around her chest, just barely concealing her breasts and hinting at her cleavage. It wasn't overtly sexual, what am I saying, but there was an undeniable intimacy to it. A quiet confidence. Her lips were slightly parted, her eyes sleepy but focused on the lens.
What the fuck.
It truly did catch me off guard, my head shot around the library to make sure someone didn't walk in on me looking at what they could consider porn in the library. When my gaze returned to the screen, the picture was still there. It wasn't even just that. This wasn't a small secret either. This album was filled with hidden gems that Danielle would never let anyone, especially not Hanni or Haerin, see.
It goes back to a year and a half ago, which I assumed was when Danielle started university here. These photos were her diary. The most vulnerable parts of her life she stored here. The very first and oldest photo in this album was a shy but alluring photo where she had just taken off her t-shirt, her arms covering her petite breasts, a shy smile in her lips but her eyes screamed with a mischievous energy.
A few swipes, more, more, of her just taking provocative and risqué photos in the privacy of her own room. Who were these for? I mean, my question was answered almost immediately when I swiped onto a video that started on its own. The sudden sound of slopping sucking as someone recorded Danielle. A close-up shot of her bobbing her head up and down on some dick she took all the way in like it was nothing.
Her 'mhm's' and moans through dick stuffed in her mouth filled my ears, and the surrounding library as I rushed to lower the volume. My heart hammered in my chest as the phone recording shook a bit, and a hand, not Danielle's, reached down to stroke her head, her moans getting more higher-pitched in response.
Who is this guy? Did Hanni know about him? Did Haerin? That was the question that burned at me when I swiped past some more photos, onto some screenshots. Screenshots of text messages I was able to see. But it was weird, I noticed the unsaved numbers at the top were changing often. Too often.
Pieces started to fall into place, this time capsule of Danielle's activities since she started school formed a pattern. She was getting a new boyfriend, a new fling, or whatever you'd like to call them. At least it looked like a new guy every month, maybe even week at the rate of the different photos and videos she was sending them. Photos of her naked on her back as she filmed her own breasts being massaged. Pictures of her with semen covered lips. Videos from a guy's point of view as they had passionate sex.
I scrolled through months of her history with these strangers, of which most conversations had no connection between them. Messages like, ‘when are you free?’, followed by a ‘after my class, you can come over’ from Danielle. Or this one, a guy says, ‘you look so fucking hot in this one’ with Danielle simply responding, ‘thanks!’
And these pictures had her in various locations. A dorm room, a shower, one looked like an empty classroom late at night. She's been taking guys over to the dorm behind her roommate’s back for what looked like a while. Or maybe Hanni knew, who knows?
I saw a text message screenshot of a groupchat, the name being 'study groupp', which stuck out to me. There was not a group chat for me, Hanni, nor Haerin. What study group is she talking about? I hurriedly opened up a Message window, searching for this groupchat, finding it just weeks down the line. My breath hitched when I clicked in and was greeted by a list of random guys.
Most numbers were unsaved to her. Some were saved as what appeared to be real names or something generic. The name of the chat made a sick kind of sense. As I scrolled through, it dawned on me that Danielle was the center of an underground sex hub for these men to get off on her. Her. And only her.
It's hard to make sense out of it all. Truly, it is. When you see the sweet and innocent little Danielle get passed around like a shared textbook for these horny guys who she's been sleeping with for over a year, you wouldn’t believe your eyes either.
It's more than that though. This was more calculated than just some slutty girl looking to have some fun in her college years. That playful fairy-like personality, that friendly smile she always had for everybody. Those were a mask, a tool.
That's how she did it, wasn't it? Lure men in with that teasing look, speak sweet nothings with undertones of debauchery. I’ve seen it firsthand, and shit, I almost fell for it.
Hold on. Was she trying to recruit me to this groupchat?
A cold shiver traced its way down my spine despite the warm, stuffy air of the library. Was that it? That whole little show with her hands on my thigh, the look in her eyes, everything before this day, was it all a tryout? Was I being evaluated? Not only has she made her home under my skin like a parasite, her little secret had her completely burrow into my brain now.
I found videos and photos inside of that sex group chat that Danielle didn't have in her hidden album. There were conversations so degrading that the way these guys talked to her made me feel physically sick. Yet, in return, she sent them messages of herself telling them how much of a needy little slut she was for their big cocks with a bright and cheerful tone.
This was a different person. Danielle lived a different life, and she kept it under wraps from everyone who only knew the bright, bubbly young woman she showed the world.
They used her and paid her. Or did they pay her? I saw no mention of money, so no, she wasn't a prostitute as far as what this tells me. All this told me was that she did this for the love of the game. A thrill. A hobby. My stomach sank when I saw a section of the group chat congratulating and thanking Danielle for what I made out to be 'the New Years party'.
What happened at this party?
There were numerous videos of it actually. Of Danielle being the life of the party, but not in the way you might expect. In one video, she was getting spitroasted and being filmed from the view of another party. In the background, numerous legs and feet that moved by. There was background music playing over their skin slapping.
Another video had Danielle crawling around on her hands and knees, butt naked and sticking her tongue out at the jeering group of what had to be over ten guys surrounding her in a circle.
Another showed her passed out, naked and used on her back as several men took turns emptying their seed all over her chest and stomach. I truly felt sick when at some point in the video, the person holding the camera went right up against Danielle’s face.
She lied there, her eyes staring right into the camera in a tired daze. All the men were just laughing and ridiculing Danielle right there and then. She looked completely spent and used. Despite that, under all the videos, Danielle thanked them for coming and a Happy New Year.
All this. Hidden away in her phone. The thought hit me over the head like a brick. My grip on the edges of the laptop screen tightened. My mouth was dry. This was too much. It wasn't just one guy. It wasn't a series of short-lived relationships. This was a whole secret community.
My head was swimming. The happy, carefree image of Danielle was replaced with this... this performance. The cheerful, slightly-too-intimate touch of her hand on my leg replayed in my mind.
This was so twisted. And it made so much sense. The way Hanni watched her. The hidden look of daggers. Was she one of the only ones who knew? Was it possible she knew all about this and it was obvious to her that Danielle was teasing me? Was it jealousy or was it disgust? Maybe it was both. Maybe Hanni was in love with Danielle and couldn't stand to see her debase herself this way.
Whatever, it wasn't my problem. The matter at hand was what the actual fuck I do now. I stared at the mountains of evidence on this screen. This secret life wasn't just hidden, it was the secret foundation of her friendships and her public image. A single screenshot, a single forwarded video, and Danielle's entire world would implode. Her bright, bubbly persona would be incinerated. Hanni and Haerin would be devastated.
This was a dangerous kind of power. And frankly, it worried me how smoothly I started to AirDrop and send every bit of it to my phone. My phone started to absorb all of Pandora's Box like a vacuum. The photos. The videos. The group chat logs. Everything.
I carefully, meticulously, closed every new application, every window I opened, making sure the laptop was exactly as it was when the girls left. I put her back on that blank document. I moved the laptop perfectly centered in front of her chair.
It was all said and done. But I felt it. Something changed. Without a doubt. The power dynamics between Danielle and me. I used to flinch and hesitate when Danielle did her occasional flirting under their noses. But with this? Now knowing the kind of girl she really is?
I don't even know how long it must've been. I was simply rapidly tapping my pen against my head while I gawked blankly at the table in front of me. The silence was heavy now, no longer peaceful, but charged with all I had just learned. The image of her face, covered in semen in some messy dorm room, kept flashing behind my eyes like a phantom, a gruesome afterimage superimposed over my notes.
I was stuck until I heard them coming back, their distant laughter and chatter drifting down the aisle and pulling me back to the library's reality. My muscles tensed up. I forced my face into neutral, a performance of my own. I glanced over. They came back together with little paper napkins each carrying a donut.
The girls laughed as they took their seats. Haerin kindly set down a glazed donut on a fresh napkin right in front of my textbook. "They're good," She said simply. She sat in her usual seat, a small smile on her lips.
"God, that place is a madhouse," Hanni declared, unwrapping her own donut. "Art students are vicious." She took a big bite, chewed, then settled back into her chair.
Danielle dropped into her seat next to me, sighing dramatically. "Fighting to the death over a cup of coffee. Wild stuff," she agreed, tapping her laptop. Her movements were easy, unconcerned. She gave me a quick, bright smile. "You should be happy you missed out, Minjae. It was a massacre."
There it was. That smile. That effortless charm. Except now I knew what was hiding behind it. Fuck, I don't know. Was it a normal smile? Was she trying to get into my pants? I couldn't be rational. The question, like a mosquito, buzzed relentlessly in my skull.
"Yeah, well," I managed, my throat dry. "My GPA will thank me." My gaze flickered down to my phone in my lap. The device felt hot, radioactive.
Did I do something wrong? There was some part of me that regretted opening Pandora's Box. I gave Danielle a quick glance, and on cue, flickers of Danielle being violated on her stomach kept coming up in my head. I could've lived my whole life not seeing what I just saw. Does it stain every kind and nice thing she's done for me?
She was my friend. A close one even. I could vividly remember the small moments of her laughing at something I said, or whenever she makes sure I’m awake during class. I didn’t want the side that I discovered to completely over take the idea of her in my head.
I tried to focus, but the donut in front of me looked less like food and more like a piece of scenery in a play I'd stumbled into. I picked it up, the sugary glaze feeling sticky on my fingers. I took a bite. It was good. But it tasted like ash and secrets.
Friday | April 12th, 2024 | 8:23 PM
"Jesus, it's like looking in a mirror," Nakyung simply said, her eyes glued to my phone screen, her usual sarcastic smirk gone, replaced by a weirdly fascinated, clinical stillness. I sat on my bed while I stared off into nothing, listening to the sounds of her swiping through the various media, through Danielle's whole life since starting college.
Right after our study session was concluded, I immediately called for Nakyung to come over, saying I had something urgent only a friend like her could help me with. I shouldn't have been surprised by her level-headed reaction, she knew what I meant.
She paced the room, with small audio bits of the different videos of Danielle cutting and starting. My friend was inspecting Danielle, every angle, every moan, every text with a meticulous kind of curiosity. "Wow," she said, pausing on a video of Danielle, bent over a desk in what looked like a university office, some anonymous guy's hands gripping her hips. The audio of her moans was almost embarrassingly loud in my dorm room.
"She really gets into it, huh? All for free." Nakyung continued, tapping the screen. I said nothing. What was there to say? My entire stomach felt like it was lined with lead. Nakyung, on the other hand, was in her element.
"Look at her go," Nakyung mumbled, her tongue darting out to wet her bottom lip. She handed my phone back to me, finally breaking her focus. "I'm not going to beat around the bush, Minjae. This is the jackpot. We struck oil."
"Yeah, it's-it's fucking insane," I said, my own voice sounding foreign to me. I could only imagine going to class and seeing Danielle with that bubbly personality. She smiles and grins at every little thing and is friendly to everyone she knows. How did she hide such a damning double life?
I took a peek up at Nakyung who was quite literally stroking her chin now, deep in thought with her eyes all bright and excited. The little gears in her head started turning, she wasn't thinking about Danielle's state of mind or the emotional damage or any of that moral bullshit.
She was thinking of strategy. An opportunity. And I knew she would. It was the exact reason why I called her. She could navigate this murky waters far better than I could. I could only ask the one person who knew exactly what to do with a loaded gun.
"So," Nakyung started, tapping her chin, her pacing resuming. My room wasn't big, and she traced small circles on my floor. "We have everything we can possibly have to get an edge over her." She stopped her pacing, turning to me abruptly. My heart thumped at that statement.
I knew where she was leading, and frankly I didn't like it. To this day, Tzuyu still haunts my head. The amount of pain and fear I instilled on her still eats at my thoughts to this day. The unhinged side of me that kept me at bay while I forced myself onto her while she cried for her life is something I never want to unlock again if I could.
"Nakyung," my own words came out weaker than I intended.
She knew what I was about to say, and beat me to the punch, "Remember Minjae, you're alright with this."
It was like some sort of trigger word. A rush of feelings and emotions from that memory with Tzuyu ran over me once more as that thought crossed my mind. The excitement and lust I felt during the moment overpowered my judgement completely. That same dark, twisted curiosity is what landed me in front of her laptop in the library. And it was the same dark, twisted part of me that told me to call for Nakyung.
She read my face like she was my own conscience, or rather, my devil. "The part of your brain that wants her panties, that loves that thrill of taking something without asking."
"Yeah," I sighed, feeling that hesitant, whimpering side of me disappear under a sea of rising darkness. I felt like someone was holding my limbs down and forcefully pulling me underwater to cover my senses. But I could see it. It wasn't even about panties this time. It was about a different level of power. "Okay. So... what?"
"So," she smiled, a wide, predatory grin that I knew well. "We have options. So, so many options." She plopped down onto my bed, bouncing slightly as she landed, and leaned in close, conspiratorial. "We can always run back what we did to Tzuyu, simple blackmail and have her put on a show for us, a reward for you, maybe me, too."
I almost nodded but my throat coughed up a bit of vomit, a sickening lurch of excitement warring with the acid in my stomach. Tzuyu re-entered my mind as I started to replay that night.
My hands on her wrists as I pinned her onto the concrete. The painful shrieks as I forced myself into her. The emptiness in her eyes after sustaining scratches and bruises all over her body.
Was that what I wanted from Danielle? To see that cheerful fairy face collapse into abject terror and submission? A small, repulsive part of me said yes, a dark tremor that shot right through my core. But that part of me was scared too. I enjoyed it too much last time.
Watching Tzuyu get led by Nakyung on her hands and knees, bare naked like a dog, was a surreal out-of-body experience that I wasn't completely proud of. Nakyung, however, seemed to remember only the triumphant parts.
"Of course, we can do so much more, this is super valuable dirt. Think about it. You want Hanni on your side? This is the key. She's obsessed with Danielle? Now we have leverage on Danielle." She pointed out.
I bit my cheek as I thought about it. All of a sudden, Hanni entered my head. She sat naked with Danielle and the two of them held each other as they looked at me in a weird fantasy.
"We can make them do whatever we want." Nakyung continued, fueling the dark fantasy playing out in my head. "We could make them compete against each other for their freedom."
Nakyung was painting a vivid image for me. My mind started to run rampant.
Though, Haerin appeared in my head weirdly enough and I'm back at the library. She's sitting there, studying, minding her business. While her friends were under the table, sucking me off, I watched Haerin scribble a tiny footnote. She looked up at me, our eyes holding for a while before she grinned, chuckled, and looked back down at her work.
I blinked and looked up at Nakyung who was still spouting out more and more dark ideas about what she could make Danielle do.
"Actually," I said softly, which was surprisingly just enough to shut my friend's fantasies. The smile was still on her face but her eyes had widened. I had her full attention. "Maybe something... different. Less explosive." Nakyung watched me, her head tilting like a curious cat. She wasn't judging, just calculating.
"I don't want... that," I finally managed, trying to articulate the swirling mix of revulsion and reluctant desire inside me. "Not the Tzuyu route. This is... better than that."
It was Nakyung's turn to be quiet for a long moment. The predatory gleam in her eyes softened just a fraction, replaced by something else. Something closer to respect, or at least, a recalibration of her strategy. She was trying to understand the particular brand of monster she was dealing with today.
"You weren't there, Nakyung," I groaned, letting the memory of sitting across a broken Tzuyu guide my words. "Seeing the life leave someone's eyes, their spark. That kind of thing... it crushes them. Please, I don't want to hurt Danielle." I took a breath. "In that way."
Nakyung scowled and shook her head, "Of course."
She crossed her arms and tapped her fingers against her bicep, "I can't change you. It's just who you are." She let out a sigh, but it was a fake one, one made for show. "Okay, Mr. Morale," I rolled my eyes as I could feel the sarcasm drip from her tone of voice, something she often used when she didn't get her way, "What's your play then? How do we play with your new toy?"
"I don't know," I said quietly, looking down at my phone at the folder full of Danielle.
"You want to play hero?" Nakyung suggested suddenly, the word dripping with disdain. "Play the hero. We can do that."
Nakyung took out her phone and started tapping the screen with her thumb, "We can do that." She muttered again, more for herself. "She needs to learn her lesson, I can arrange that for you."
She turned her phone's screen towards me. She had Danielle's number dialed and ready to go with a hidden number, a trick we used to use religiously in middle school to prank call random people. I could only sit back and watch Nakyung's volatile mood take flight.
"A little scare," she whispered, her thumb hovering over the green call button. The ringer was turned all the way up so I could know she was for real. It rang out two times. The silence in between ring two and three felt stretched and fragile. And then, through her phone's speaker, the call connected. Then, Danielle's sweet, melodic "Hello?"
I held my breath. My knuckles were white where I gripped the mattress underneath.
"You fucking bitch," Nakyung simply delivered. Her tone was completely cold, stripped of any emotion, making the words land like bricks. Nakyung was glaring at me as she said this, so it could be directed towards both me and Danielle.
"E-Excuse me? Who is this?" Danielle's voice, still sweet but now with an undercurrent of confusion. A sliver of fear?
"You fucking slut, you're a fucking slut, you know that?" Nakyung continued. The room suddenly felt claustrophobic, even though I was the one who brought Nakyung here. "Do you have any fucking idea what you did?"
"I... I think you have the wrong number. Who is this," Danielle said, her voice faltering. I could picture her on the other end, her brows furrowed in that cute way they do when she's confused, looking around to see if she was being watched. She still hadn't hung up. Morbid curiosity.
"I caught my boyfriend, you fucking bitch. I saw your little groupchat, nasty whore. Fucking my boyfriend. Fucking every single boy at this fucking school. Are you proud? You disgusting tramp," Nakyung fired off, and my skin started to crawl. This felt way more severe than deserved.
There was a choked silence on the other end, so profound I could have mistaken it for a dropped call. There was a sharp intake of breath. A gasp. And then, dead silence. My chest felt tight. We had her. In that moment of silence, Danielle Marsh wasn't a bubbly fairy, she had become a trapped animal. We could practically hear her brain whirring, connecting the dots, the horrible, terrifying realization dawning on her.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," I suddenly heard her speak, her words a shaky, desperate whisper. They rushed out of her, tripping over each other. "I... I didn't mean to, I..."
"Shut the fuck up, slut," Nakyung commanded. Her tone was absolute, a complete shutdown. I watched as a small, sadistic smile started to creep onto Nakyung's face.
In the background of Danielle's end, I could hear a faint voice. "Danielle? Everything okay?"
"You're so fucking disgusting, a new guy every week didn't satisfy you so you had to fuck my boyfriend too? How does it feel, you greedy bitch?" Nakyung continued, completely ignoring Danielle's plea for forgiveness.
"Nakyung, stop," I found myself unconsciously mouthing the words, but Nakyung had started moving around the room to not see.
The other voice was clearer now, I should've known it was Hanni's. "Danielle, who's on the phone? You look like you've seen a ghost."
"I-I'm sorry," Danielle repeated through her tears, her words dissolving into a pathetic, garbled mess.
Hanni's panicked voice was tiny and distant. "Danielle?" A little scuffle sounded over the end before Hanni's voice was clearer, "Hello? Who is this?" It came through, louder and closer. She must have grabbed the phone from Danielle.
"This is none of your fucking business, you nosy tramp," Nakyung responded. I flinched at her words. "Keep your fucking bitch on a tighter leash. She's costing people their boyfriends."
"Who the fuck is this?" Hanni's voice was no longer confused. Her usual playful warmth was gone, replaced by a steeliness that was sharp and surprising.
"This isn't your problem. Your fucking whore for a friend is busy fucking every girl's boyfriend on campus. Her stomach is filled to the brim with nasty sperm from guys who will never love her. But it's what a stupid little worthless slut like her deserves after all, isn't that right?" The disgust in Nakyung's voice was palpable. The disgust she was using felt so visceral and true that for a split second, even I began to believe it.
Danielle was softly crying in the background, "I'm sorry..."
Hanni must've been at a loss for words for a bit as another silence filled up the line. Nakyung pressed on, "If your friend wants to continue making a whore out of herself, fine, but she's gonna have to learn. I'm posting these videos everywhere, sending them to her family, and fuck it. I’ll post this everywhere to every student at this fucking school.” Danielle let out a genuine, horrified shriek. It was a sound of pure panic, like a small animal caught in a snare. "No, stop! Please, please! I'm sorry!"
"Fuck that, you weren't sorry when my boyfriend's dick was deep inside you, you cheating little cunt," Nakyung snapped back, her voice seething. "Now everyone will know what a disgusting slut you are."
Hanni joined in to plead, her tone shifting to submit to the power Nakyung had held, "Please, don't do this. She didn't mean it, it’s not her fault." She sounded almost as scared for Danielle as Danielle was for herself.
“Not her fault? Are you fucking serious? Who, in their right mind, goes after another girl’s man? Scratch that, who loans themselves out like a fleshlight to every guy she talks to? Your fucking whore friend, that’s who,” Nakyung messed with her hair, like she was actually tormented about Danielle.
“They said they were all single,” Danielle tried to argue, as if it made her case any better. “I swear, I didn’t mean to get in the way.”
“You’re fucking disgusting,” Nakyung groaned, “What kind of sick woman wakes up with dick on their mind? Is making sure your pussy is filled really one of your top priorities?”
“Stop it, please. Look, what do you want! She said sorry already, she didn’t mean it, what do you want!” Hanni talked, her care for Danielle shined through in her pleas.
Nakyung had been pacing the room, her phone gripped tightly in her hands. She then stopped pacing right in front of me, and she raised an eyebrow towards me.
This was it. The checkmate.
"Tell you what. I won't leak your slutty videos to the entire university. Hell, I'll even delete them," Nakyung said, her words slow and deliberate. She glanced away from me but held a smile that could have frozen hell over. "But you have to do something for me, and you have to do it with no questions asked."
Nakyung paused, letting the suspense hang heavy in the silent room, and heavier still through the phone's receiver. The only sound was Danielle's ragged, hitching sobs, "Yes, I'm sorry. Please. Anything," She stammered.
"You ruined my fucking relationship," Nakyung paused to shudder as if she was truly affected by this made-up story. She took a deep breath, gathering all the faux emotions she conjured up. "I want to see you ruin your relationship."
"W-What?" Danielle choked out, the sound of utter, sheer confusion. My eyebrows furrowed as well.
“I want you to watch your best friend fuck your boyfriend, got it? I don’t care how it happens, as long as you know what a broken relationship feels like.” Nakyung declared. I didn't even get a chance to correct her that Danielle doesn't even have a boyfriend before she continued, “I’m not fucking around neither, I expect a video by next week or else I’ll make the video of you getting your brains fucked out the background of every computer on campus.”
Nakyung stared right at me while she delivered her last lines. The weight of her request was preposterous. Her plan was far-fetched and convoluted, relying on too many unpredictable moving parts.
"Fucking whore," Nakyung ended before unceremoniously ending the call with a decisive tap.
Silence crashed down in my dorm room, but it wasn't peaceful. It was the ringing, suffocating silence that comes after a sonic boom.
The predatory smirk was firmly back on Nakyung's face. She tossed her phone onto my bed, where it bounced with a soft thud. "There you go. Go play the fucking hero."
I had to take a moment to myself. A moment where my breathing became my primary focus. I had to keep that under control. The image of Danielle breaking on the phone had shaken something deep inside me, something I didn't know was there.
"What the fuck was that?" I asked as calmly as I could. But underneath, an inferno was starting to spread.
“I did you a favor since you went ahead and decided to let your dumbass conscience get involved. Now we both get what we want," Nakyung sighed dramatically. "The hero gets to save the day. And the villain..."
I jumped up from the bed, "What the fuck are you going on about, hero, villain? You realize that's a real person with feelings."
"Yeah, alright," Nakyung rolled her eyes, completely oblivious to any real empathy. She just thinks I was making excuses for not wanting to get my hands dirty again, "I didn't hear you complaining when Tzuyu's tears were rolling down her face because of you."
"You know I regret that," I insisted, my patience wearing thin. I didn't want that. I didn't want this. I didn't want any of this to define me, to be a stain on my character.
"Don't kid yourself," Nakyung sneered. “You fucking loved it, you only got cold feet after the fact like that makes you some good guy because you regretted it at the end.”
"What the fuck, Nakyung," I slapped my hands to my face, muffling my groans of frustration. "What the fuck." I was shaking.
Nakyung stood there with her hands on her hips, unimpressed. "Get over it. You're such a fucking crybaby. Now, we have to figure out the details."
"Is that all this is? A game, plan, whatever the fuck? Do you realize what you're doing?" I demanded, my hands falling from my face. "She sounded terrified."
"And she needs to be," Nakyung shot back, stepping closer, her index finger jabbing towards me. "The whore deserves it. This will teach her not to be a fucking skank."
It sounded crazy ironic, coming from Nakyung after all. The sex-crazed fiend that would push anyone onto her friend to get her own fix has a problem with being a "skank".
"Are you okay, Nakyung," I asked, softer, my body relaxing, "Why do you hate her so much? You don't even know this girl." My fists were balled at my side but I really tried to undo them. I really needed to know why Nakyung was doing all of this. Being such a villain, it wasn’t a character trait I’d ever think I see in her.
Nakyung's face cracked under my question, a second of her true feelings seeping out. "It's not that. It's what she represents." She stared back at me and snapped back into place, "Shut the fuck up."
I pressed Nakyung, my hand carefully reaching out and setting on her arm to hold her. "I'm serious, Nakyung. What's wrong with you? Talk to me, please."
Nakyung tried to shrug me off, "Get the hell off me."
"No," I said back, pulling her closer, "Tell me what's on your mind, Nakyung. I always tell you what's on my mind."
Her arm broke free of my hold and before I could attempt to dodge, her palm slapped right across my face with a force enough that I reared back. I felt a sting from the hit. This was unexpected.
My silence probably concerned her, or at least she realized her actions were too extreme, her face contorted to guilt before her anger came back and her glare got stronger. Her breath was heavy and her small shoulders rose and fell.
"Fuck," Nakyung whispered to herself, her hands moving up to cover her face. I didn't mind her hitting me. I was honestly more worried for her than my own face.
"What is it," I said one last time. “Please, tell me.”
"Everything," her hands fell to the side and she collapsed on my bed, face-down into my pillows, her hair splayed out like a messy halo on my comforter. "It's all so fucked up, Minjae."
"What, tell me, please. You've hid this side of you from me for so long. Please, just let me help," I said, walking over to my bed to sit down near her.
A faint sob escaped from her, muffled by the pillows. She shook her head. I could see her body trembling. Her body shivered as I placed a hand on her back, her breath still shaky. I didn't expect this either. Nakyung was a storm, this chaotic force of nature. Seeing her like this, vulnerable and small, felt like the sun going out.
She turned her head to the side, her face half-buried in my pillow. "I hate myself," she confessed into the plush fabric. A real admission. Not the performance-grade dramatics she threw around for fun. This was genuine.
"What? What are you talking about? Nakyung, you..." My words stumbled and failed me. Nakyung? The girl who was the center of her own universe?
She sniffled loudly. "I'm disgusting. I'm just a cum dump, a stupid slut, that's all I am."
This wasn't the Nakyung I knew. That girl reveled in her sexuality, in her control, in her own twisted morality. This was a stranger wearing my best friend's face.
"What's gotten into you," I tried to say.
She let out a weak, wet laugh. "Don't you get it? You think you're the one who's broken? With your panties and your secrets and that little self-loathing voice in your head?" She turned to look at me, her baby blue and pastel pink hair askew, and for the first time, I saw not a predator but a reflection of my own struggle. "I'm a fucking mess, too. I'm worse, at least you have standards."
I tried to recall all the times she pushed me, encouraging my worst impulses. "I thought you liked... this stuff."
"I do, and it's- Fuck, I can't. Fuck," she pressed her face back into the pillow with another frustrated whine, pulling at her own hair. "I thought I was being mature, but fuck, all the guys, all of them, I let them do whatever they want because it made me feel like- like something other than a fucking loser. Like I had some kind of power for a little bit and... and I realized it's a sham."
"It's not sham, Nakyung, what-"
"I'm just a slut, who can't help being a slut, who then gets to come down here and judge some other slut for being the same type of slut she is!" Her voice cracked on the last word, and I saw it. The anger she let out on Tzuyu and on Danielle was just a fire aimed at a mirror. They embodied the same parts of herself that she hated the most. She was jealous of their willingness to be so openly broken, while her own brokenness ate away at her, hidden behind a smirk and a manipulator's confidence.
"I don't even feel love anymore," She mumbled pathetically into my pillow. "I can't, I just see men... and I see conquest, I need them to want me, I'm just... so sad. It is so sad. Everything is just about sex to me because I can't get any of that normal love stuff like your Chaewon."
"I wish I was you, even with your fucked-up issues. I wish I could actually have a normal life." She admitted, tears soaking into my pillow. "I can't even picture what a healthy relationship looks like for me anymore. I wouldn't even know how to have one if it was right in front of me."
"Damn, Nakyung," I whispered, the weight of her confession suffocating. The room spun. The girl who had been my devil on my shoulder for months was showing me that she had her own, far more vicious demon.
I sat there, just stroking her hair as she started to calm down, her sobs subsiding into quiet hiccups. We sat in that silence for what felt like an eternity. My stinging face was a distant complaint. This new landscape of my best friend's psyche was far more terrifying.
"You're the closest thing I have to a normal relationship," Nakyung murmured. My heart ached. "You don't look at me like how other guys do. You let your own weird freak flag fly, so mine doesn't seem so bad. I need that." The statement hung in the air, sad, true, and monumentally selfish. I was her safe space, not as a friend, but as a fellow monster, a measure to assure her she wasn't the lowest form of life in existence.
I don't think I really knew my best friend as much as I thought I did. How was I supposed to know what demons she harbors?
Jesus, the self-loathing was real for her too, and it came on stronger than mine. I've never seen her this unhinged before. The way she lashed out at Danielle over something so trivial and personal was more for herself than for me. To see herself in that girl made her want to break her.
That's just a different kind of sickness. And it was a part of her that I couldn't begin to understand without being in her shoes. And even so, I still had no idea. How would I handle being summarized as nothing more than a cum dump? How do I live for years after that fact, knowing that my value is derived from others' lust? How would I feel to see others revel in their slutiness when all it did was poison me.
She finally looked up, her tear-streaked face a mess. She wiped her nose with the back of her hand. "Are you gonna... fuck off now that you've seen me ugly-cry?" Her usual snark was a weak imitation, a ghost of her former self.
"No, dipshit," I said, trying to force some normalcy back into my tone. "I'm your friend."
She let out a long, shaky breath, her body slowly relaxing, "I'm sorry I slapped you, Minjae."
I waved a dismissive hand, "Don't worry about it."
She sat up, pulling her knees to her chest and wrapping her arms around them. "Do you wanna fuck?" she asked out of nowhere, her attempt at deflection clumsy and sad.
"Of course, not. Sick fuck," I tried a chuckle.
She managed a small, watery smile. "God, you're right."
"We're both some fucked up characters," I shook my head. "Look. That girl... we can't just-"
"No, you're right," she cut in. "She'll call you. You know it's going to come."
Nakyung finally regained some composure. "There is no boyfriend. I know that. But you're the next closest boy that she'll think of. She knows, and I know, that you're a good person. The good boy," she smirked.
It was an odd compliment coming from her.
"She'll come crawling to you, Minjae, for help," Nakyung's analytical mind continued through the rough breakdown she just had. "She's desperate, and that fake scenario I gave her... she'll remember her 'good friend Minjae.' He's always been so helpful. You know she's going to call. And that," she pointed a finger at me, and for a second, a tiny flash of the old Nakyung sparked in her eyes, "is when you save her."
"This feels wrong," I admitted. "Playing with her mind like this."
"Welcome to the world we've always lived in, Minjae," Nakyung said, her voice hollow. "There's no going back to being innocent. We lost that privilege a long time ago."
"Yeah, fair enough."
And it seemed like right on cue, my phone buzzed with an incoming call, the screen lighting up. Like a fortune teller, Nakyung was right. Given time for Danielle to process and talk things out with Hanni, her rational brain has gone into overdrive to try and find a solution, any solution to her crisis.
Which led to me. I stared at Danielle's name flashing across the screen.
Nakyung stood behind me, peering over my shoulder. I saw our reflection in my dark screen before I answered, our two heads, mine tense, hers unreadable.
"Play dumb, remember?" she whispered into my ear, her breath warm. "You're just her nice, helpful friend. For now."
I took a deep breath, sliding my thumb across the screen to answer. "Hello?" I did my best to sound relaxed, like I had just been minding my own business. Probably playing a video game or something.
"Minjae?" Her small, trembling voice came through the speaker immediately, thick with unshed tears. Just hearing her, a wave of that guilt and shame washed over me again, the product of Nakyung's attack.
"Hey Danielle, what's up?"
"Are- Are you busy?" she asked, her words a panicked rush. "I need... to talk to you." She was breathing heavily into the phone, it was clear she was still crying and shaken. I could hear Hanni's muffled hushed whispers in the background.
"No, not at all," I replied, leaning back against my bedframe, forcing my body to look casual. "Just chilling. Everything okay? You sound a little... off."
"Fuck," She whispered.
"Danielle?" I asked, playing my part, infusing my voice with genuine-sounding concern.
The dam broke. "Minjae, I'm in so much trouble," Her entire sentence hitch on a sob. The sound went straight to my gut. "So, so much trouble."
"Okay, okay, slow down," I soothed, my eyes meeting Nakyung's in the dim light. She gave me a subtle, sharp nod, an unspoken 'Good. Keep her on the line.'
"This is going to sound crazy, but please, just listen to me," Danielle begged, her words slurring together. I could only imagine how she looked right now. A complete wreck. "There's this... someone... they called. They... they have things... videos... of me."
My breath hitched in a performance of shock.
"They said... they told me they'd send them to everyone, my parents, my friends, everyone... unless I did something for them." She was rambling, a panicked stream of consciousness.
"Fuck," I dragged out the expletive. Then after a calculated second of silence, "Blackmail? What is it, what do you need to do? Money?" Nakyung gave me an appreciative thumbs up at that. Directing the narrative.
"Please, don't say anything to anyone. Don't tell Haerin, please Minjae. I don't... I don't know what they'd think of me," The desperation in her plea was palpable.
I felt a pang of actual sympathy amidst the layers of manipulation. "My lips are sealed, I swear. So what's the deal?"
"Will you have sex with Hanni?"
The question hung in the air in my room, so abrupt and insane I think Nakyung nearly burst out laughing. This was the twisted, ridiculous demand from Nakyung's play, filtered through Danielle's panic and misinterpreted into a command for me.
I played my role, my own stunned silence stretching for an uncomfortable few seconds.
"What?" I finally asked, my voice cracking just the right amount. "Danielle, what the hell are you talking about?"
"No!" she cried, frustrated, flustered. "I mean... The caller, they... they want to watch Hanni have sex with my boyfriend. To 'break' my relationships, to see how it feels. But... Hanni, she and I... there's no boyfriend! I don't have one."
A little rustling followed by a faint mumble and finally Hanni's voice, "Minjae, I'm so sorry."
"It's okay," I mumbled back. "Hanni, what's going on?"
"They said they'll delete the videos of Danielle if she just understands what a broken relationship feels like. They assumed she was dating someone, and they said they wanted a video of me, uhm, fucking her boyfriend." Hanni sounded sick, "But... she's not dating anyone. We can't do that."
"We thought," Danielle cut back, her voice a fragile little thing, "that the caller doesn't have to know. They don't know who you are... maybe you could... pretend to be him? We-we need proof."
"This is insane," I breathed out. "Completely insane." Nakyung nodded slowly, a crafty little smirk dancing on her lips. Her multi-layered plan, born from her own self-hatred, was somehow, impossibly, working.
"Minjae, please," Danielle was begging now. The words were almost incoherent, fused together by tears. "You're our only hope. If you just... maybe Hanni and you could... please. Just this once."
"I-I'm alright with it," Hanni added in a defeated tone of acceptance. "If that's what we have to do for you."
"N-no, it's, uh, Chaewon. I-I can't do that to her," I stammered. I threw Chaewon's name into the mix. It was my shield, my justification. It felt wrong using her as a piece in this fucked up game, but it made my reluctance seem real, noble. Nakyung's eyes narrowed for a fraction of a second, an annoyed flicker that I was deviating, but she said nothing.
Silence. A silence so thick I could feel Danielle and Hanni on the other end processing my excuse, weighing their options.
"I-I promise, this will stay between us," Hanni spoke, her tone gentle, understanding. A stark contrast to the angry, protective girl on the phone earlier. "I know... I know how important Chaewon is to you. No one would ever know." She was selling me on it. Pleading.
"Please," Danielle added pathetically, whispering into the phone.
"God..." I looked to Nakyung. She held my gaze, her expression unreadable, and then gave a single, almost imperceptible nod. The green light.
I squeezed my eyes shut, pinching the bridge of my nose as if I were in profound distress. I wasn't completely faking it. "Okay," I finally said, the word leaving a bitter taste in my mouth. "Okay. I'll do it. For you guys."
A shared gasp of relief on the other end, immediately followed by a wave of guilt washing over me. "Where? When?" I asked.
"Our dorm," Danielle answered immediately, her breathless gratitude washing through the phone. "Whenever possible. T-They gave us a week, but the sooner the better. To get it over with." Her resolve was clear now. She had accepted this twisted solution.
"Right, um, I'll text you when I'm free this week," I promised, my mind already scrambling.
"Oh my god, Minjae," Danielle was crying, but these were different tears. "Thank you, thank you so much, I promise I'll make it up to you."
"Don't mention it," I said, my own voice rough. "We'll figure this out."
"Thank you," Hanni said softly.
We said our awkward goodbyes and I ended the call, letting my hand fall onto my bedsheets. The screen darkened, but I could still see the faint reflection of Nakyung's triumphant grin.
"Holy shit," she breathed, clapping her hands together once, a sharp, sound. "That was... that was perfect."
"It was sick," I countered with a sigh, my words heavy. The performance was over, and only the sickness remained.
"Still perfect." She insisted, flopping back onto my bed. "You won't hurt her like Tzuyu. She won't be broken, she'll just be... used a little. Saved. You're the hero instead of the monster."
The words felt hollow. Was there really a difference? The lines were so blurred now I couldn't find them anymore. All I had managed to successfully do, was talk myself into having sex with one of Haerin's closest friends, all while I was supposed to be dating Chaewon. The level of fucked up in this situation was astounding.
I needed something good in my life. Something to cling to amidst the filth. Something to keep this rot from overtaking me completely.
Nakyung climbed off my bed, stretching languidly. "Well, my work here is done. Let me know when you're going to film your little masterpiece."
"Do you want to talk about it more? I'm here, you know, you're already here," I offered, trying to steer the conversation away from her malicious plan and back to her emotional confession from moments prior.
"Nope," she popped the 'p'. She moved to my door, her usual swagger back in place, if a little stiff around the edges. "We've got our roles now. We have to commit to them from now on. Don't go soft on me, kinky hero." She opened the door and slipped out without another word, leaving me alone in the quiet bedroom. But it was never quiet. My own thoughts, Nakyung's cruel command, Danielle's terrified whimpers, they all echoed in the sudden emptiness.
I picked up my phone with a tremor. My thumb hovered, moving through my gallery where Danielle's digital soul remained trapped. I needed a reset. A clean slate.
My thumb scrolled to my contacts and landed on another number. Chaewon. I stared at her name, a flicker of shame in my chest. But a larger, more desperate part of me needed this. I needed to hear her voice, feel her warmth. Everything always felt better because of her. She made everything feel okay again.
Before I could even ring her, someone was calling me.
'Mom'
It felt like my blood itself had turned into ice, and my room dropped a billion degrees. I read each letter in my head over and over again. I can't say she was the worst thing that's ever happened to me, but it would be a close call. My chest felt unbearably tight, like the walls were physically pushing inwards. Why would she be calling me? I haven't spoken to her in months.
I was a ghost in my own family, invisible and silent. My mom and dad created the monster, but it was my mother who always threw salt in the wounds. I cut them off of my own volition when I purposely moved into dormitory living. It was a sanctuary away from their endless torment. So why? Why was she calling me?
My thumb acted on its own, autopilot engaged by years of conditioning, tapping the green accept icon. The silence lasted for maybe three seconds before I heard a shuffling and an exasperated gasp from the other side.
"Hello," I said, my stomach clenching on the word, waiting for the usual vitriol. That utter disdain she had for me for being a lying child all because I didn't know how to tell on my father. The years of feeling worthless because of the unspoken verdict that I was somehow at fault for my mother and father's falling out.
What was it going to be today?
"Your dad is sick," was all she said. The venom wasn't there, not yet, but the exhaustion was heavy, a lead blanket over every word.
I froze. A cold knot formed in my stomach, a feeling I couldn't quite place. It wasn't empathy. Not grief. Not worry. It was dread. The dread of a door reopening that I had spent years trying to bolt shut.
And in that brief, horrifying silence, I did what I always do. I broke it all apart with questions in my head, my mind's own private cacophony that nobody would ever see or hear. I didn't have any good memories of him at all, but I was a little surprised by the hollowness in my chest hearing those words.
"What?" I finally managed, my voice betraying no emotion. A perfect, blank canvas.
"Sick," she repeated, her tone flat. She was getting to something, I knew this much. She never just said things. There was always a price. "I told him, I told him drinking so much was going to kill him. Did he listen? No. He never listens to me. To anyone." The bitterness was starting to creep in, familiar and corrosive.
"Okay," I said, keeping my responses short, non-committal. Not out of contempt, or anger, or some sadistic indifference. But because the guilt of not being able to properly respond the way a son would weigh heavily.
"Liver cancer," she said, the words stark and blunt. "It's bad. The doctors say... they don't know."
I leaned against my desk, my legs suddenly feeling weak. Cancer. Not a sudden heart attack. Not a drunk-driving accident. Wow. Something slow. Something agonizing.
"How's he doing now?" I asked. I might've had a thousand different reasons to loathe him, but even this, the idea of a drawn-out, painful end for anyone, especially if that anyone was my own father, was enough to soften me for the briefest of moments.
"He's... weak," her voice cracked, a small fissure in her armor of resentment. That was new. But she quickly patched it up. "He's been doing appointments and tests all month. It was a nightmare, but he got everything he needed. He's being a stubborn mule, of course. Refusing help."
That was the father I knew. Silent. Stubborn. I pictured him lying in a hospital bed, refusing water or comfort out of sheer pride, and that hollowness inside me solidified into something heavier.
"Month? When did you find out?" I asked. I needed details for a timeline my brain could process.
"The doctor called late last month," She mentioned, briefly.
A whole month. And she's calling me now?
"Okay," I said again, my hand gripping my phone ever more tightly.
"We didn't want to bother you," she said, and the words were so ridiculous I almost laughed. Bother me.
"Right."
The call was silent. I was standing in place, staring straight at the floor. I hadn't moved an inch, a statue frozen in indecision.
"Well, um, let me know what happens," I said, the awkwardness palpable in my own voice. I sounded like a stranger offering condolences at a distant relative's funeral. My brain was a scrambled mess of thoughts and questions that had no answers.
"Alright," she paused. "Goodbye," I could feel my fingers starting to cramp as I listened to her tone drop into one final sigh. And that was it.
The call ended. The silence that returned to the room was heavier than before, a thick soup of unprocessed grief and ancient resentment. She didn't ask to see me. She didn't ask me to come. Just an information drop, like reading about a tragic but distant event in a newspaper.
My legs finally moved, stumbling me over to my bed. I sank down onto it, the mattress groaning under my weight. I just sat. I didn't think. There was nothing to grab onto. My phone was still showing Chaewon's contact page. The thought of calling her now just didn't make sense.
I didn't want to see him. But I didn't want to not see him either. It was like wanting to scratch an itch at the back of your throat you can't reach. The conflicting emotions paralyzed me. Nakyung was right in some ways. There's no going back to innocence. Our childhoods weren't the fairytales the other kids had, they were minefields. Mine was a childhood of unspoken things, loud arguments I could hear through my bedroom door, and watching as my relationships withered away.
I stood up and went over to my desk, my hands grabbing the back of my chair. I hate what they did. And yet. A tiny, stubborn part of me felt a pull, a distorted sense of loyalty that I despised. They were still my parents. The very definition of the word, even if it was a perversion of what a parent is supposed to be. I picked up the chair and with a visceral scream, I threw it across the room.
Oof! Lot to unload here, a lot indeed! Finally got to unveal the true nature of sunshine fairy, Danielle! It's always been decided since I drafted her character that I wanted her to have a similar secret to Nakyung's. I just had to rewrite her arc since it's come to my attention that most readers enjoy it when Minjae is actually putting in work and not jerking it by himself. Hope my little workaround hits the balance of realism so it doesn't take you out completely. Blessing in disguise really, now I get to write a fleshed out smut chapter of Danielle and Hanni! Woof! What a duo!
Plus, I got to write more about Nakyung's character, her completely shattered personality. Got to say, she's been one of my favorite characters to write about, even more than Minjae and I practically gave birth to him! Something about the complicated way she thinks, sometimes making sense, sometimes not, I find it so true to even myself when I tend to think about things. I could never get a coherent thought through, letting my own emotions and thoughts conflict. Guess that's the con of not wanting to go to therapy, hehe.
I wanted to have Minjae's past more involved too, I felt I never really hammered the idea that the reason Minjae is the way he is is because of the way he was raised. I'm not sure how many readers are interested but I wanted to flesh out a MC that isn't a perv for no reason. Of course, sure, you can be a perv for no reason besides just liking being a perv. But I wanted to illustrate why Minjae goes to these extremes for underwear worn by hot women, because realistically, no one is doing all of this for underwear you could buy at your local store for cheap! Why his father ignoring him and giving him the cold shoulder, and why his mother who did nothing but berate him chisel that broken mindset of his. I felt it was a rather good story device to invest into, and now with the reveal of his parents coming back into his life, sets him up to do some wicked, and I mean wicked things.
As for the late update, that's on me! Frankly, school is swamping me right now. Who assigns a shit ton of work right BEFORE exams? I get working on it will 'hammer in' the information we need for the finals. But I need that quality time to study! You're wasting my time when I could be cramming, plus writing my fanfiction I really want to finish! Not only that, I've been trying to quickly write out drafts for the next couple chapters since right after this semester ends, I'll be going on a month long vacation with my family! I know, I know, I didn't know of this until recently but I wanted to make sure I had something to work with, as drafting is a majority of the process. I'll save the revisions for when I get back, or when I have time during my vacation! I don't want you to think I'll be on a short break, think of it like how I pride myself of trying to get chapters out biweekly, I'll post them like uh, tri-weekly? If I even could, no promises! I just wanted to let you guys know, because I didn't want to leave loyal readers in the dust with why I'm not posting regularly. Just a couple of chapters to go, who knows, maybe the idea of a spin-off will come to me. Besides that, love you guys, see you when I post again! - PI