He had been trying to get himself together for a moment, but when Kim Seunghun suddenly pressed the intercom, Andrew only blinked, looking flustered.
Click.
At the sound of the door opening, Andrew swallowed hard and closed his eyes again.
“Oh! Dad!”
Grace’s bright voice, which he had only heard over the phone.
He heard the voice of the daughter he had missed.
Now he only had to open his eyes…
Maybe because he still was not ready in his heart, they did not open easily.
“Who’s behind you…? Oh my God!”
When he opened his eyes, Grace, who had grown a great deal over the past two years, came into view.
But his daughter’s eyes were fixed on Kim Seunghun behind him.
“Oh my God, Ryu?”
“Huh?”
Kim Seunghun behind him also blinked, looking flustered.
“Wow! No way! It’s Ryu Seongmin!”
“Th…”
Cold sweat ran down Kim Seunghun’s back.
The venom-filled eyes Andrew was showing right now.
They made the friendship they had built up until now feel like nothing at all.
In front of those venom-filled eyes, even hunger was easy to forget.
“Ahem…”
At Andrew’s forced cough, Kim Seunghun swallowed hard.
Those eyes were almost like the gaze he had when looking at Ryu Seongmin during the filming of <Space Vagabond>.
But this time it was not acting.
It was real…
“What are you doing at the door? Hurry up and come in!”
When Evelyn’s voice came from inside, Kim Seunghun put on an awkward smile and lightly pushed Andrew’s back.
Then, watching Andrew’s mood, he said to Grace,
“Oh! So you’re Grace. Haha. I heard a lot about you from Andrew hyung. Wow, who did you take after to be this cute?”
“…”
After Andrew’s scary silence came Grace’s bright answer.
“I don’t take after Dad. I’m pretty because I take after Mom. Hehe. Yesterday, I watched Space Vagabond, and it was so good! At school too, that’s all anyone talks about… Wow, Ryu Seongmin is in our house… Mom! Mom!”
Grace left only a short greeting for Andrew and ran to Evelyn.
Then Andrew said through gritted teeth,
“I’m so. glad. Grace likes you.”
In a voice that sounded not glad at all, Kim Seunghun asked in a slightly trembling voice,
“Haha… I’m okay, right?”
“That depends on what you do from here on.”
After Andrew snapped that at him and went inside, Kim Seunghun followed him in too, looking uneasy.
“Looks like you’ve been doing well. You seem to have lost a little weight too?”
“Yeah. I worked out hard. The person behind me is…”
When Andrew pointed at Kim Seunghun, Evelyn’s eyes widened.
“Wow… it really was true!?”
Evelyn said with a smile.
“I thought Grace was lying when she said Ryu Seongmin had come… Ah! Your name….”
“Please call me Seunghun. Haha.”
“Yes. Mr. Seunghun. It’s really nice to meet you. Is this a dream or real life? They’re making such a fuss at the company where I work too. If it’s not rude, could I ask for one picture?”
At Evelyn’s words, Andrew said in a grumbling tone,
“Couldn’t we sit down first?”
“You take the picture.”
“…”
Andrew took the digital camera, and took a picture of Grace, Evelyn, and Kim Seunghun smiling warmly together.
After that, Kim Seunghun said with a smile,
“Hyung, you take one too.”
“Me? Forget it.”
“Come on, don’t be like that. You talked about Ms. Evelyn and Grace the whole time on set.”
At Kim Seunghun’s words, mother and daughter tilted their heads in surprise.
“Huh?”
“Enough. Just take the picture.”
Andrew’s face turned bright red, as if embarrassed. Then he handed the camera to Kim Seunghun.
Looking at Andrew’s expression, stiff as a stone statue, Kim Seunghun said with a smile,
“Smile a little. You’re meeting your family after a long time. If someone saw you, they’d think you’d run into your enemies.”
“This person is just like this.”
“That’s right. Smile a little!”
Andrew forced the corners of his mouth up and made a sound.
“Ha. Ha.”
Andrew spent a dinner time that felt like a dream.
Evelyn was as beautiful as ever, and Grace was still as adorable as ever.
It felt like he had gone back to the past, and a smile came naturally to his face.
“Oh, right. I have gifts, actually.”
After the meal, Andrew took out all the things he had packed in his bag.
The moment she saw the <Space Vagabond> figures, Grace cried out.
“No, no way!”
What Grace was clutching tightly was Ryu Seongmin. No, Kim Seunghun.
As if Nix Road did not even enter her eyes, she set only Kim Seunghun on the dining table.
“Aw… Grace… Nix Road is prettier though…”
When Kim Seunghun said that carefully, Grace answered brightly.
“I like Ryu the best.”
Kim Seunghun glanced once more at Andrew’s eyes, still full of venom, and said,
“Still, even so…”
“Wow! Kor 2138! Look at this! It’s so cute!”
As if he resented himself for losing to a machine, Andrew now wore an expression close to despair.
Then Grace smiled mischievously, held up Nix Road, and stood in front of Andrew.
“Dad, are you sulking over something like this?”
“No. I’m not sulking.”
In a voice that anyone could tell was sulking, Grace shook her head and shouted loudly.
“You disappeared for two years without showing your face even once, and you’re sulking over this?”
“That’s…”
Grace puffed out her cheeks and cut Andrew off.
“Whatever it was!”
He could not even bring himself to say he was sorry.
He had been trying to act as if nothing had happened, but the one who really opened the conversation was his daughter Grace.
“It wasn’t because of you that I got bullied by the kids. I never even thought of blaming you for that.”
“…”
Kim Seunghun gave an awkward smile and pointed toward the room, and Evelyn nodded.
“Why are you the only one carrying everything alone like that? We’re family.”
“There had to be someone to take responsibility…”
“Who told you to take responsibility? Staying beside us is also taking responsibility. What you did was avoid responsibility, not take it.”
Maybe it was because his daughter had grown up so sharply and clearly.
Even though it was a situation where he was getting scolded by his daughter, the corners of Andrew’s mouth lifted slightly.
“I’m sorry, Grace. I won’t go anywhere anymore. Dad really…”
“If you go anywhere again now, then I won’t see you anymore.”
“Haha, okay…”
Andrew pulled Grace into a tight hug.
As his daughter, whom he had only seen in pictures, entered his arms, Andrew’s vision began to blur.
The embrace of family that he thought would have to remain buried only as a memory.
The embrace he thought he would never be able to return to again.
In that warm embrace, Andrew held his breath and quietly waited for the tears to settle.
A few days later.
NBC in America.
The conference room of a late night TV show.
The atmosphere was slightly noisy, as if the meeting had just started.
“Who was this week’s guest again?”
“Paul Gilbert.”
“Haha! Right! This’ll be fun! Oh God! Just thinking about it already has me in stitches! Haha…”
The blend of the talk show host Conan’s trademark self-deprecating gloomy jokes and his witty facial acting rang through the conference room, and a few of the staff snickered.
“Damn it. What if I get arrested at this rate? The least funny comedy show host in the world. Think prison time would cover it? Aaagh! Tom Gilbert? Damn it! The least funny human being in the world!”
Conan let out a deep sigh, pulling the corners of his mouth down so far they nearly touched the floor.
“Isn’t there anyone else we can call… apart from that guy’s face, he’s famous for not being funny. Ratings are going to tank again this time too.”
“Still, there’s nothing we can do for now. We have to defend the ratings somehow.”
“That’s right. We have to make it entertaining somehow.”
At the staff’s words, Conan frowned and said,
“In Conan on the Aisle, should we parody The Lord of the Rings or something… damn it. If I say we’re parodying The Lord of the Rings to that guy, he’ll smash my head in. There are all kinds of rumors that he absolutely hates anything that makes him look ridiculous.”
<Conan on the Aisle> was a segment that parodied famous movies.
When the guest was an actor, they would parody movies that actor had appeared in.
“Haha, that’s true. His private life is a bit of a mess too. We need to be careful not to get hit with backlash ourselves.”
“That’s not really important. Unless he’s completely gone off the rails, like an actor who used to suddenly say he was off to do drugs in the middle of filming.”
Because in Hollywood, among the people who lived off popularity, there were not many who were actually decent human beings.
They looked fine on TV or on screen, but in private there were plenty of severe cases you would want to avoid altogether.
“Should we bring in someone more fresh next week?”
The youngest staff member asked in a bright voice that did not suit the current mood.
Late night shows were places even superstars came to.
It was too obvious that someone fresh, whom people barely knew, would not bring proper ratings.
But that voice was unnecessarily bright.
As if drawn in by it, Conan asked the youngest staffer,
“Someone fresh? Who?”
“Space Vagabond is totally hot these days.”
“Hmm, that’s true…”
Conan had already seen the movie too.
He had been drawn in by the flashy effects, but it had been hard to find information on the cast.
At best, there was Andrew Shakill from <The Lord of the Rings>.
Other than that, he knew nothing at all about the director or the Asian actor.
“That Asian actor was handsome. Should we try booking him?”
“Ah, but. I think the director would be more interesting than the actor.”
“You’re saying we should book a film director?”
The youngest staffer, excited that people were listening to him, spoke with a grin stretched from ear to ear.
“There’s even a rumor lately that he joined hands with the producer of Space Vagabond and is making a production company in LA. It’s called Seonghyeon KMD Pictures…….”
“Huh……?”
Conan asked with his eyes widening in surprise.
“Whoa, your eyes are about to pop out. I keep telling you not to open them that wide.”
At another staff member’s words, Conan snorted and said,
“He came straight over to Hollywood after one movie!? I mean, of course, if that movie is Space Vagabond, that changes things, but still… Wow.”
Conan snorted in disbelief.
“I don’t know whether he’s an interesting person or a boring person. I don’t even know if he can speak English yet, but if we can book him, don’t you think it’d draw a lot of attention?”
“Hmm… a Korean director boldly throwing down a challenge to the Hollywood film world?”
“Yes! Exactly that! How many people in the world would actually do something like that? And if we can just get him talking a bit about Space Vagabond, a lot of people enjoyed that movie too, so the ratings would probably be pretty good.”
At the youngest staffer’s words, the corners of Conan’s mouth slowly lifted as well.
He had no idea what kind of person the director of <Space Vagabond> was, but come to think of it, just the fact that he had made a movie like that already made Conan certain that he was not an ordinary person.
‘Whether he’s a unique kind of person. A crazy kind of person. Or what kind of material he’s made of.’
There was nothing he could predict and no information at all, but for Conan, that was what made him interesting.
“Hmm, it is fresh… if we actually book him, I guess I’ll need to study Korea too.”
“Well, your brain’s good enough. You’ll be able to come up with questions or a concept that suits a Korean in no time.”
Conan acted out a goofy grin at the compliment and gave a thumbs-up to the staff member who had praised him.
“Then for now, hmm. Let’s try booking the director of Space Vagabond. I’ll do a bit of studying too with my brilliant brain.”
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