Page 19 of Damian & Jun: Episodes 1-4
“Maybe—if you were a better leader—we would be. But you make expensive choices, Jun. Always have to have the best of the best. This choreographer. That set. Live musicians at an awards show. And I’ve respected that. But you also have to survive as a business. I love you like a son, I do; do you think I’d be calling on your debt unless I had to? I’ve been letting it slide for years. I even stopped the interest while you were in the army.”
Jun’s hand curled into a fist. “I want to understand, Bak. The numbers don’t add up. Show me where the money’s going because I know?—”
“No.” Bak stalked forward, backing Jun into his bed. “You don’t want to understand. You’re spoiled and selfish, and you won’t even have dinner with a friend of the company to save us.” Bak’s eyes turned positively dangerous with a hint of dark elation. “Don’t forget what happened to Rei can happen to you.”
Cold flooded through Jun’s body. Fuck. What had happened to Rei? He’d never been satisfied with the answer back then, and now….
Bak was still talking. “You have until the evening of January first. And since you’re…going through it, let’s just make sure you’re not getting harassed online, why don’t we? You two, check his room. Make sure none of his fans have bugged it again. We can’t be too careful about security.”
Jun closed his eyes. He didn’t want to see them toss his room. It wasn’t the first time, but since he’d returned from the military, it was the first time they’d done it in front of him on such a flimsy excuse.
His ever-quick brain ran through scenario after scenario, but the only path that held any hope was to hold still, as still as a rabbit, and wait. Eventually, Bak would shut up. Eventually, his goons would stop tearing into the thin, pretty much nonexistent privacy of his bed and his keepsake drawers and his desk.
It was three against one, and he knew all too well what had happened to Rei. The boy wasn’t even a private citizen anymore. He was in a mental hospital. Severe stress and complete psychotic snap were the words on the street, but some people whispered the problem was sanity, not insanity.
“I know people stress you out,” Bak was saying, his voice mixed into the roar in Jun’s ears. “I’ll handle your calls and social media. Let’s just make sure that you have some quiet time to think about it. Come to my office when you’re ready to set up a date. Oh, and actually, I came in here because we need to update your ID and bank cards.”
“I’ll do it myself,” Jun mumbled.
“Obviously, you’re too busy and stressed. We at BBB3 provide everything our talent needs.” Bak lifted Jun’s wallet from his desk.
He didn’t even take out the bank cards, just took the entire wallet. As if he wasn’t already holding Jun’s passport for business purposes and “security.”
Now he didn’t even have an ID. Though maybe he didn’t need one. All he had to do was get someone to search the internet for his face.
Bak and his goons were at the door. Bak looked back, fake kindness all over his expression. “Don’t worry, we’ll get everything back to you shortly. So sorry about the inconvenience. Computers are the worst.”
And then they were gone, shutting the door behind them.
He stood there a long time, his hands curled into fists. One by one, his senses seemed to return to something like normal. He could feel his heartbeat thumping too fast in his chest, feel the air from the air-con moving against his skin. Like a robot, he started to put the room back to rights, pulling the sheets back down over the mattress and putting the cover back on the duvet. They’d pulled it entirely off. His pillow had been opened. He closed it and put the pillowcase back on it. Then he started on his desk, picking up dropped bits of paper and putting items back in the drawers and pens back in their cups.
And then he remembered. He’d left Damian on read.
Damian would see that he’d read his message, and he’d be waiting for a reply, but…he had no phone.
Jun’s knees gave out. He dropped, by inches to the floor and curled up, pressing his eyes into his kneecaps and hugging his legs against his chest.
Inside his house shoes, he could feel the sim card, but that was all he had left. They’d even found the battery.
At least the phone would wipe itself when they failed to break into it.
Fifteen years of work, and this was all he had to show for it. One tiny room that didn’t even belong to him, a boss who was going to have him committed or raped, and a sim card without a phone.
He was as helpless now as he had been the day he first arrived in this country.
Seventeen Years Ago: Jun
Nine-year-old Jun looked around the Incheon International Airport. It was full of things he didn’t recognize like large line pictures that looked kinda like Chinese characters but somewhat kinda wrong.
“Mama, what does that say? The writing is weird.” He pointed to a red and gold advertisement with shining white diamonds on it. They looked like real versions of a reward on one of his video games.
“That’s Hangul.” His mom squeezed his hand and did that smile thing that told him she was trying to be happy but wasn’t. He pushed up against her in a half hug as they walked away from the gate they had just arrived through. Through the windows, it was late afternoon, but everything felt off. His body said it was a completely different time, and he felt like he’d been awake for days. “Hangul is one of your languages, too, Jun, just like Mandarin or English. It belongs to you.”
“But I can’t read it?”
“Just because something belongs to you doesn’t mean you know how to use it yet.” She squeezed his hand again. “Your father is going to help you learn about this part of yourself. It’s not something I can do.”
“You taught me Mandarin!”
