Page 13 of Tell Me Where It Ends
“Don’t you have a shoot soon?” I ask, breaking the quiet.
He yawns, stretching. “Yeah. In a… few hours, actually.”
“You?”
Reality hits. I power on my phone. Notifications explode across the screen. My chest seizes.
One name repeats over and over.
Kang Shin.
What have I done?
?Go back to the apartment to see Shin.
Turn to page 54
?Stay with Suho a little longer.
Turn to page 130
?Skip both and go alone.
Turn to page 217
4c
Walking Alone
I need some air.The thought hits sharp, like a physical need. “I’m going for a walk,” I announce, not looking at Shin directly.
He looks up from his laptop, worry instantly creasing his brow. “Alone?”
“I’m a thirty-one-year-old woman, Shin. I think I can handle a ten-minute walk without a security detail.” The sarcasm cuts sharper than I intend.
He looks like he wants to argue, but he just says, “Okay, but we’ll need to go to the police station. The faster, the better. Our team says it’s best to be proactive. Don’t stay out too late.”
I sigh and nod, then pull on an oversized hoodie, tug my cap low, and slip on a mask. The door clicks shut behind me.
I know it’s a terrible idea. One blurry photo, one person recognizing me, and the internet will have another field day. Words move fast; rumors move faster. I’m already the main character in their storm. I don’t need to give them another chapter.
But being stuck at home with my overcaring manager feels smothering. So I leave.
Outside, the Seoul night is crisp, edged with the tang of street food and the gritty scent of the city. It feels like a held breath—poised between everything changing and nothing ever changing at all.
I shove my hands in my pockets and walk with no destination. Past shuttered shops and neon-lit convenience stores. Away from Shin’s quiet concern. Away from Suho’s chaotic pull. Away from the cameras, the headlines, the hashtags. Just… away.
It hits me then—how utterly alone I am. No manager, no lover, no family, no stylists, no entourage. Just me and the pavement.
For the first time in over fifteen years, nothing is mapped out. It’s unsettling—and somehow liberating. Maybe that’s why I don’t stop.
If I go home—my real family home, right now—I know exactly what I’ll find. My father slumped on the couch with a half-empty soju bottle, the TV blaring to an empty room. The stale, heavy smell of alcohol and regret.
Best case: he’s passed out. Worst case: he’s awake, asking for money, his eyes never quite meeting mine. And sometimes, it could be both in the same evening—switching from unconscious to insistent, as if my presence can feed the void he carries.
I still have nightmares about being sixteen—hands shaking, panicking as I check his pulse and call for an ambulance. I’m terrified of opening that door and finding that same scene waiting for me, of hearing him mutter her name in his sleep—my mother’s name.
Sometimes I think my career doesn’t just give me a future; it saves me from my past. The grueling trainee life—the dorms, the endless rehearsals—is an escape. I’m too busy, too exhausted to think about anything else. Especially not my family.