Chapter 837. Sequence 11
Mijoo frowned the moment she saw Lee Miyoon enter the shooting set. That cruel old woman always treated Gaeul-unni badly. She had never walked past unni nicely even once. In places where there are many people, she would just give her a glare and walk by, but in places without people, she would pick a fight with unni without holding back. What’s up with your eye makeup?; What’s up with your hairstyle?; What is up with your clothes? Nitpicking her appearance was on the better side. Sometimes, she even told her off for things that couldn’t be seen. The words that Mijoo thought were the most absurd were ‘your energy in treating your senior is bad.’ Just what the heck was that ‘energy’? Whenever she heard that old woman’s nitpicking that didn’t even make sense, she sympathized with unni.
For the past two years, she worked as unni’s stylist, she had never seen that old hag say nice words to her. The queen of the set, who did not mind other people’s eyes at all, always walked around with her head held high and scolded unni. The members of the staff who were close to unni sympathized with her, but they would not dare go against the queen and always stayed silent. Mijoo also stayed obedient because of the rumors she had heard, but once, anger got the better of her, and she tried to pick a fight with her without holding back. That was when unni stopped her. Do not ever try to fight her – unni was rather scary when she stared right into her eyes as she said such words. Back then, she felt a little frustrated as well. After all, she was trying to stand up for her, and yet she got scolded instead. Only later did she find out that Miyoon didn’t like her and that she would not be able to set foot in the industry again, much less come back to the TV station had she picked a fight that day. The rumor that she had s.n.a.t.c.hed the name tag of a staff member and then handed it in to the front desk to fire that person was definitely not an exaggeration.
“That hag doesn’t even get old.”
“I’m sure she must manage her appearance a ton. According to the rumors, she spends hundreds of millions every year going to a dermatologist. She literally put billions on her face, so it’d be pitiful if she didn’t look at least like that.”
“Not only that, I’m sure she ate so many insults that she might live a long life.”
The staff gathered around and commented. It seemed that these members had already experienced something bad because of her. As the only roles she played were main character’s mothers, kind neighborhood ladies, and gentle high-cla.s.s ladies, she was known to the audience as an actress with a good personality. Mijoo realized just how scary image-making could be by looking at Miyoon.
“Miss Gaeul has it tough. Miss Mijoo, please take care of her.”
“Looks like I’m going to have a drink with her tonight. But heck, in the first place, why is she visiting a shooting set for a drama that she doesn’t even appear in?”
“Because that woman’s hobby is to make rounds through TV sets. It seems like she likes it when everyone looks up to her.”
She talked with the floor director who had been working for three years before giving him hints and staying silent. Someone from the lighting team was walking over from the other side. Although the general opinion of Miyoon was incredibly bad, it wasn’t that there was no one on her side. In fact, there were quite a lot of people who stood up for her. The best example of that would be the lighting director. The two of them got along so well that Miyoon sometimes called him her partner. Miyoon would find out if they talked behind her back with that person around, so they had to be careful.
“The producer must have it hard too. He has to walk on a tightrope between those people.”
“Isn’t the director close with Lee Miyoon?”
“He’s just giving her the superior treatment because he has no other choice. Being a director, he can’t just outright hate people, can he? Especially if that person is Lee Miyoon. Don’t you know that story from before? A newly recruited a.s.sistant director came to the drama department and called Lee Miyoon without having a clue and had to end up apologizing that day. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but I heard that he apparently even kneeled.”
“He had to apologize just for calling?”
“Apparently, it was because that new recruit called her ‘Mrs. Lee Miyoon,’ and being her, she told him to say that again. Feeling something strange, the a.s.sistant director said ‘senior,’ and he got called immediately.”
“What’s so wrong with ‘senior?’”
“It’s because he didn’t call her ‘madam.’ She flipped the whole drama department over saying that an immature idiot doesn’t even know how to work properly.”
“Senior or madam, same thing.”
“She just didn’t like the fact that she was called directly without going through the manager. Of course, that’s a mistake too, but denouncing people’s character like that just because of that is going too far.”
“It’s going too far, way too far, in fact. I wonder what ghosts are doing, not possessing people like her.”
“I don’t think ghosts can do anything about that woman.”
Even the most resentful ghosts might run away in the face of Lee Miyoon’s evil glare. Miyoon, who was talking to the producer, suddenly waved. The one who received her call was Giwoo.
“Doesn’t that woman look after Giwoo-oppa a lot?”
“She always likes ones that do well.”
“But unni is doing well too.”
“That’s because Miss Gaeul doesn’t relent. That old hag likes people who are on her level but would still give her a good level of respect. She would never give a second glance to young actors, no matter how respectful they act. In fact, they would get slapped if they tried talking to her.”
“Giwoo-oppa must have it hard too, going along with that woman’s antics.”
“Giwoo is a kind guy, so Lee Miyoon won’t say anything to him. She doesn’t touch good-looking men anyway.”
Miyoon suddenly burst out laughing as though she heard something funny before pinching Giwoo on the cheeks. Giwoo acted gently like a grandson in front of his grandmother. After letting Miyoon ma.s.sage his cheeks for a long time, he barely managed to escape. Mijoo subconsciously sighed. Pitiful Giwoo-oppa.
“Does she even want to do that at her age? I mean, she’s going to be sixty in a couple years.”
She felt bad when she thought about Giwoo, who was smiling on the outside but would definitely not be feeling the same on the inside. How could two humans be so different? One side made everyone nervous and anxious just by appearing, while the other made people smile just by being there. It was a good thing that the two people neutralized each other. If the queen was here by herself, she would be walking on thin ice right now.
She was glaring at that hateful face when someone tapped on her shoulder. She thought that it was the floor director who was behind her and turned her head around, which almost made her scream. A woman wearing a stiff black leather jacket had a thin smile on while looking at her. She was Lee Miyoon’s stylist.
“You seem to have a lot of dissatisfaction towards the madam, huh?”
She saw the floor director hurriedly waving his arms in the air in unease behind the stylist. He was explaining the reason why he wasn’t able to tell her about this woman’s appearance beforehand. It seemed to be some grand reason but that wasn’t the important thing. The important thing was that the floor director wasn’t caught, while she was. She suddenly lost strength in her lower stomach. She had heard that the queen’s stylist hadn’t changed for the past fifteen years. The fact that she lasted 15 years under a woman who treated other people like dogs because of her whimsical needs must mean one of two things: her patience on the level of Buddha or Jesus, or she was the same kind as the queen. While she had never heard about the queen’s stylist, Mijoo intuitively thought that it was the latter. The way she looked down on other people and the smile that looked like she was having d.a.m.n fun was way too similar to Lee Miyoon’s.
“Me?”
And thus began the thorough self-defense. It was obvious what would happen if she admitted to it. She had to play dumb and erase what she said with her mouth.
“Why are you suddenly pretending not to know? I heard everything. I wonder how absorbed you were in back-talking her that you didn’t even realize that someone was watching you from behind.”
The words that came out from those reddened lips felt like blades. Her skin felt p.r.i.c.kled as though she had been cut.
“What did you hear?”
“This and that about the madam. You’re going too far, holding a person in so much contempt. Our madam is such a kind person.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“Then are my ears weird? Should I get them checked out? I definitely heard it, but you said you didn’t say it.”
Her lips became dry. It seemed that this woman was out to kill. Mijoo actually felt frustrated as well. She only said the truth, but she was being nitpicked. That said, she couldn’t exactly tell this woman to go back to Lee Miyoon and tell her what she just heard. The size of her fear eclipsed her courage to fight back.
“You’re quite rude. Someone’s talking to you, but you’re just staring as though it’s none of your business. You’re making me the weird person.”
“Uhm, that’s not it.”
The queen’s stylist raised her hand to interrupt her. Those curved lips of hers signalled that she had enough of playing around.
“I should tell the madam myself.”
“What?”
“I may have heard wrong, but I heard it after all. The madam will make the judgment. Now that I think about it, you are Miss Han Gaeul’s stylist, aren’t you? How peculiar. The stylist of the rude actress that keeps talking bad about the gentle madam is talking bad about the madam too. It’s a little too weird to be a coincidence, don’t you think? I guess this is what you call ‘like actress, like stylist ’, right? I don’t really like saying this, but you’re quite ignorant.”
Mijoo abruptly raised her head while listening. She could tolerate everything else but not her looking down on unni.
“Excuse me, why are you talking like that? Fine, I was in the bad, but how is our unni involved in any of this?”
“Why are you getting angry all of a sudden? Did I say anything wrong?”
“Just because there’s a hole for your mouth doesn’t mean you can say anything you want.”
“A hole?”
“What else? Then is it blocked off? I can see that it’s wide open. Heck, I can even see some gold teeth in there. Those are hard to come by these days.”
The queen’s stylist, who had her mouth agape because of the absurdity she felt, twitched her nose and closed her mouth. Mijoo felt good for having one-upped her but became depressed again after realizing that the situation hadn’t improved at all. But still, she was not going to act like a defeated dog and lie down with her limbs in the air. Considering all the things she received from unni during the past two years, she would rather take the blame on herself. She did not want to sell unni off in order to escape this dilemma.
“They say you can get a glimpse of what the person is like by looking at the people working under them, and indeed, the stylist is such a sn.o.b.”
“Oh, so you work ‘under’ her? What times do you think we live in? My unni treats me like her equal.”
The stylist was at a loss for words again. The leisurely expression on her face had disappeared as well. She felt like a wall had appeared in front of her eyes. She was worried about the consequences, but she felt refreshed right now. It would be great if that woman grabbed her hair first. If it was a dog fight, she had confidence not to lose. She even sent a signal to fight, but the stylist took two steps back as though she had no intention to. It seemed that she was confident in letting her mouth do the fighting since she had the queen as the backer, but was afraid of actually clas.h.i.+ng. Mijoo was drenched in a sense of victory when,
“I shall go speak to the madam.”
The stylist pulled out her sword. Mijoo lost her strength in her abdomen again. In the end, this was how it was going to be. Once Miyoon came around and said a word, she would not be able to speak a word back. The word ‘fired’ floated around in her head. It was a word that was very likely to become real. Now that she was actually driven into a corner, her pride and whatever didn’t matter anymore. She wanted to grab her and apologize to her but that woman walked away without even looking back. Mijoo clasped her hands. Her hands were drenched with sweat. Winning a battle gave her a short moment of joy, but winning the war was impossible. There was no one who could stop the queen once she came around.
“Noona.”
There was a person who blocked the stylist from going back to the queen. It was Kang Giwoo. For a brief moment, he really seemed like a prince on a white horse.
“Oh, Giwoo.”
“You should’ve come to see me if you were here.”
“I was just going back.”
“Really? Then let’s talk outside. The weather’s good. I had to go buy coffee anyway, for the madam.”
When Giwoo dragged her by the arm, the stylist’s ice-cold face soon turned warm. The stylist laughed while covering her mouth and walked outside first.
“I’ll handle this. Don’t worry.”
Giwoo said those words as he walked past Mijoo. Mijoo felt as though the world that suddenly turned upside down again was put back in the right position. The sharp pain in her lower stomach had waned as well. She couldn’t find Giwoo, who was waving his hand as he left, more reliable.
“That’s a relief. I thought something was going to happen.”
The floor director came around. Mijoo replied back with ‘you’re right’ before glaring at him.
“You should’ve told me if she was here.”
“Sorry. I was away for a bit because of a walkie-talkie message, and she came at that time.”
“You are such a meanie.”
“I’ll buy you something good next time. Let me go for today.”
Mijoo glared at him once more before looking at the entrance, hoping that nothing bad would happen.