Page 57 of Tell Me Where It Ends

“I’m fine,Imo,” I say, the lie tasting flimsy.

“She called, you know,” she says, her voice casual, but her eyes are fixed on me, gauging my reaction. I don’t have to ask who she is. “Just to ask. She saw the news.”

My mother. A ghost who lives in Jeju and occasionally sends out smoke signals through my aunt.

“What did you tell her?” I ask, my voice carefully neutral.

“I told her you were strong. That you have good people around you.” She pauses, her gaze pointed. “Do you? Have good people?”

The question hangs in the air. I think of Shin, a man so good he’s practically a human weighted blanket. I think of Suho, a beautiful, glorious dumpster fire I can’t seem to stop running toward.

Good people? Absolutely. The right people to help me figure out who I am without a script? The jury’s still very much out.

“I think…” I start, the words feeling new and strange on my tongue. “I think I need to be alone for a while.”

My aunt just nods, as if this is the most logical conclusion in the world. “You can stay heretonight,” she says, already pulling a fresh set of blankets from the linen closet.

Later, curled up on the guest futon, the blankets heavy in a strangely comforting way, I finally pull out my phone. It buzzes in my palm, small and insistent.

There’s a message from Suho—some link to our agency’s internal news, about an upcoming press briefing.

A stupidly hopeful pang echoes in my chest, a ghost I know I need to exorcise. I don’t reply. I just stare at his name, at the chaotic future it represents, then swipe the notification away. A small act of defiance, but it feels monumental.

Then I open a new message and type to Shin:

I’m okay. Staying at my aunt’s tonight. I’ll be back tomorrow.

I hit send before I can second-guess myself. One message, a simple act of self-preservation. No other message is needed for kindness—this one will do. It’s a start.

***

The next morning, I wake up in a small, sunlit room to the smell of rice cooking. For a few blissful, disoriented seconds, I’m just a normal person—not someone in the middle of a paparazzi witch hunt.

But the quiet normalcy of my aunt’s life only serves to highlight the utter chaos of my own. I can’t hide here forever. I have to go back. I have to face the music—or in my case, the silent, brooding man who has taken up residence on my sofa.

Before leaving, I find my aunt in the kitchen, humming softly as she flips rice cakes in a pan. “Off already?” she asks, glancing at me with gentle curiosity.

“I have to,” I say, tying my shoes. “But… thank you. For letting me crash here. For the tea, the fruits… just everything.”

She nods, a small smile on her face. “Don’t make a habit of sneaking in late at night,” she teases lightly. “Come back when you need a real meal, not just a midnight snack.”

I hug her quickly, the warmth of her small apartment and her quiet kindness seeping into me, before I slip out the door.

“See you soon!” she calls after me, waving. I wave back and shout through my mask, “See you!”stepping into the morning light, feeling steadier than I have in weeks.

“Home,” as it turns out, now has an occupant who, while I was gone, reorganized my bookshelf in alphabetical order. That’s a sin for which he will never be forgiven.

Shin opens the door before I can even get my key in the lock, his face a mask of carefully controlled relief that probably took three hours of meditative breathing to achieve. “You’re back.”

“I’m back,” I say, dropping my bag by the door.

He put his foot down after my last ill-advised midnight stroll. Metaphorically, of course—Shin is too polite for actual foot-stomping. But he deployed his ultimate weapon: the Quietly Concerned Manager Stare™, a look so potent it could make a dictator feel guilty about questionable life choices. The subtext was clear:You are a flight risk, Yoon Min-hee. I am now your warden.A very kind, thoughtful warden who brings you chamomile tea—but a warden nonetheless.

And so, we are now playing house in the most platonic, most excruciatingly awkward way possible. He sleeps on the sofa, a silent, watchfulguardian. I sleep in my bed, feeling less like a scandal-plagued actress and more like a teenager who has just been grounded for eternity.

Shin is right there, a steady, living presence in the apartment, whose love language is a perfectly timed ibuprofen. But I also have my phone that buzzes relentlessly—a separate battleground. My decision to ignore Suho’s texts seems to have only motivated him; he now sends a steady stream of memes, cat videos, and motivational chaos, a digital tug-of-war designed to break down my defenses.

It’s the “Support Options” menu. Option A: The Stable Harbor. Option B: The Beautiful Disaster. For years, my life has been a frantic, exhausting pinball game between these two polarities.