Thursday, October 6, 2016

Kill the Lights by Jangryang

Proofreader/Editor: Kaima, Hwarang

“Haaaaaah-….”

After Mason let out a long yawn, blinking at a heavily trafficked road, Tony asked, “Did you drink a lot yesterday?” Mason scratched his cheek.

“If only I had consumed the alcohol…”

If they behaved like that under the influence of alcohol, it would have been fine. But what happened was, both sides were completely sober and so it was more uncomfortable. Well, on one hand he tried to convince himself, ‘it can happen, it’s only human’. But whatever he told himself, it felt like he would only think of last night if he saw Noah’s face again.

“No, we might not see each other again.”

Well, they don’t have to worry about meeting each other in their relationship. Hearing him murmur Tony asked, “What? See what?” and Mason shook his head.

“It’s nothing. –Ah, but aren’t we late?”

‘I heard the filming starts at 9:00 AM’. –Mason asked staring at the clock, which already showed 8:52 AM and Tony replied while looking at the heavily trafficked road.

“I think we’ll be a few minutes late… I don’t know if anyone would arrive at 9 AM sharp. Didn’t they all get drunk last night?”

‘Did the director even wake up?’ Tony asked suspiciously, and Mason was now worried about whether Vick got back home safe last night.

Since he was not a pretty girl, nothing would have happened if he fell asleep outside. But yesterday, he had shoved him into the elevator just to save Noah and pressed whatever floor button and had sent him away.

‘Oh well, an investor is more important than the director, you know’. Mason murmured an excuse to himself and as if on perfect timing, Mason’s phone beeped. It was Vick, one of the not so many people saved in his cellphone that Tony had bought him last week.

[Where is this place?]

Mason typed a reply [How should I know?]. Beep, beep. The reply came soon.

[You threw me away yesterday, didn’t you?]

[I think you were dreaming].

At Mason’s insincere reply, the other side went quiet for a while. But another reply arrived [I dreamt about you slapping my cheek saying that I can’t pee here.]

“-….”

Mason kept his mouth closed for a short while and stared at that message. He then turned off the phone screen and put it inside his pocket. More beeps came from his pocket indicating a new message, but he pretended not to hear it.

“What’s wrong? Did something happen?”

“….It’s nothing. There is something that might get me fired from the movie.”

No way are they going to fire him just for that, but since he didn’t know for sure, he told Tony and Tony trembled, “What?”

“Did you cause any trouble?”

“It really is nothing. You don’t call it a trouble for throwing the director into an elevator, do you?”

‘What did they consider it around here?’ Mason mumbled, wondering about the Hollywood life that he had not been privy to. Tony asked in a surprised voice, “You threw the director into the elevator? Vick?”

“How… Why did you do that, Liz?”

“…. That… He was trying to pee in public.”

Mason replied briefly. Tony said, “Uht…,” and closed his mouth. His face was like, ‘Really? Then you can’t do much about it,’ but then he said, “Still…” and clicked his tongue.

Around 9:20 AM, after passing through the heavily trafficked roads, they finally glimpsed at the entrance to the movie set.

“….Uh? Why are there so many people?”

Tony turned slightly at the wheel; his facial expression said there must be some kind of a mistake. And the clamoring people, who were standing in front of the movie set’s entrance, all turned to look their way. All of a sudden, every camera started to flash like crazy.

“Haley! Haley!”

“Tell us one thing! Haley? Haley!”

“What were you thinking, doing that? Were you drunk? Or was it cocaine this time too?”

People pushed their cameras into their faces, flashing out of control, and shoved their microphones. Mason fumbled and took out a pair of sunglasses from the car’s glove box and put them on. Even if he wore the sunglasses, the flashes were still too bright and left traces in his eyes. Tony asked in a scared voice

“Li, Liz, what have you done yesterday…?”

“…..”

Mason frowned slightly. Even if Hollywood was a strange place, this didn’t seem likely to be happening just because he abandoned the director inside the elevator. Maybe plotting that the director was going to pee in public was something that people criticized about?

“Can we even get inside the set?”

Mason asked while pointing at Chase and the staff, who were waving their hands, and Tony replied, “If the reporters look that determined, we can’t even move a centimeter.” His expression was grim.

“They look like they would cover the article even if they get hit by the car.”

Mason clicked his tongue. Right about that time his phone rang and Mason, who was about to ignore it, saw Gloria waving her hand and received the call.

[Haley? What’s going on?]

“I answered your call because I would like to know that too.”

[Oh my gosh. You are standing there without knowing anything? –Does Internet work on that phone? Quick, check it!]

Mason hung up and turned on the Internet on his phone. When he typed ‘Haley Lusk’ on Google, a large amount of articles popped up, after loading for a bit. There were even pictures of him checking the Internet right now.

“-…Ahhh.”

Mason mumbled, ‘This is it,’ seeing all the article titles and the pictures.

“Wha, what? What is it?”

Tony asked with a shocked face, and Mason scratched his cheek.

“This is a composite picture, right? Yeah? Don’t tell me you actually dragged Noah forcefully into that hotel room?”

“Ah, that … …It isn’t a composite picture.”

Mason replied and tried to avoid his stare.

“You walked out right away, right? The pictures may have been taken like this, but you went in because something happened and came out right away without anything happening, right?”

“…..”

Instead of answering, Mason scratched his cheek. The pictures were indeed very exquisite. If you just looked at them, it really seemed like he was dragging Noah and forcefully pushing him into the room.

He could guess who posted it on the SNS. Mason knew Joy was following him everywhere last night. He knew it but-… He had remembered until when he was escorting Vick to go to the hotel room, but then he saw Aaron and he didn’t have time to think, at all. Afterwards, what happened with Noah drove him more out of his mind.

But still, it wasn’t like he completely forgot to think about it. But honestly, he hadn’t thought it would blow up this big.

“Well, we just went inside the hotel room, why are they making such a big fuss?”

“Forcefully dragging is the problem!”

“Well, do you know how good that man is at hitting?”

He meant to say, he did drag him forcefully but didn’t rape him or anything, but Tony asked with shocked eyes.

“You, did you get hit by Noah? What on earth did you do?”

‘What on earth do you have to do for that angel-like man to hit a person?’ Tony was trembling and Mason shut his mouth.

Still this atmosphere was too serious. Noah wasn’t a virtuous, young, 20 year old. It did look like Noah was being forcefully dragged, but it wasn’t as if Mason had a gun or a knife. Also the one who got attacked was he.

“……”

Mason wondered while rubbing his still throbbing neck, and suddenly the camera flashes decreased. When he turned around, Director Vick was exiting from a taxi, looking hung over, in front of the movie set.

Vick, who looked as if he was about to run over to Mason and quibble about abandoning him, was now sporting a bewildered look upon facing the crowd of reporters. He approached Mason looking mortified, really believing that he had peed himself last night, and the reporters divided, making a small room for Tony.

Tony saw his chance and stepped on the gas pedal to drive away to the filming set, but the car still couldn’t make it far and had to stop. Because the reporters managed to surrounded the car once again. They probably thought it was better to have a word from Mason’s side, rather than Vick’s.

Mason sighed and looked around, and at that moment, the one person who could really make these people leave, appeared.

From afar, a white Mercedes-Benz, SLR McLaren, was rolling in this way.

Someone mumbled “It’s Noah!” and the reporters, who were blocking the road like crazy, suddenly parted like the ebbing tide.

Tony thought now was the chance and pressed on the gas, and the car lurched forward a little and stopped, still unable to avoid hitting the strays. It was already getting to 10 o’clock.

“If this continues, the sun will set before arriving to the filming set.”

Mason sighed, thought quickly and got off from the car.

“Liz!”

Tony shouted in panic, but Mason closed the car door and waved at him like he will be fine.

It felt a little unfair, but he couldn’t just forgo filming because of the problem he made. Of course, he felt sorry for Noah, for diverting those devil-like reporters towards him.

“Haley. Why on the earth are you bothering Noah?”

“Haley! Haley?”

“Do you even realize that you committed a shameful thing to Noah?”

Mason thought of replying ‘it wasn’t really that shameful’, but just scratched his cheek and stared at the reporters surrounding Noah’s car.

The car door opened and Phil, who alighted first, held open the back door.

While the flashes continued on like crazy, Noah just sat there for a short while with an unreadable expression.

No, it did look a little unpleasant.

“……”

Because he sat there for a long time, at one point the amount of flashes started to drop and calmed down a little.

Exactly at that moment, Noah got out of the car. Because he got off from the car and stared at Mason, the reporters made way for him, like the Red Sea parting, between him and Mason.

“Mr. Raycarlton, are you finally going to say something to Haley?”

“Can you say a word about what happened yesterday, to the public who are curious?”

“How do you feel? Don’t you think the one who spread the pictures was Haley?”

“What are you going to say to him first? As expected, did you come here to get mad?”

Everyone thought Noah would get mad at Haley or publically embarrass him. It doesn’t matter what kind of peaceful words he says. The reporters were ready to make up any provocative scene or words to add to that.

A really hot article was brewing. The reporters were organizing the article’s storyline in their heads starting with, ‘Noah, who appeared at the filming set, had a very unpleasant expression from the get go’. They plagued Noah for some answers. Noah sighed quietly and replied.

“I’m sorry. This is a personal business.”

He declined all the microphones that came his way and walked towards Mason. Mason stared at Noah, who stood right in front of him and said, “Mm,” with a perplexed expression.

First, he should apologize. Anyhow the person who took the pictures and spread them was Haley’s cousin. Physically she was still his cousin and Haley’s fame didn’t even exist from the beginning. However, it seemed like this thing has hit Noah pretty hard. It was also true that it was he who dragged Noah into the hotel room. Even though the reason was to save his life, it was still not his call to make and so he shouldn’t put the blame on someone else.

Anyway will I be dropped out of the movie? I didn’t really have any lingering regrets about being an actor, but 1.1 million dollars was too good to lose.

“Uh…..”

He was trying to apologize to Noah, who was standing right in front of him, but Noah smiled brightly bending his eyes.

“Haley.”

He gently called his name and pulled Mason’s hand and said.

“I came here to pick you up.”

“…..Huh?”

Huh? Mason blinked at what the man said, after approaching him as if he was going to curse him, and the mumbles surrounding them suddenly grew quiet. Came to pick him up? Noah, for Haley? Is he taking him to the court or a police station? Everyone’s expression said so, and even Mason felt like that.

In the middle of the entire ruckus, Noah, who was smiling brightly by himself, turned to Vick, who had been awkwardly pushed to the side, and asked.

“It seems like today’s filming isn’t going to happen. I can take him away, right Vick?”

He asked, holding up Mason’s hand that he had grabbed. After observing the people’s stares and the situation, Vick inquired with puzzlement, “Huh? Huhhh? Why Haley?”

“Because the wind is nice, I set my yacht afloat.”

“……”

‘– So?’ Everyone was thinking it, when Vick asked-

“So?”

Noah looked like, ‘what do you mean so?’ ‘Why are you asking me something so obvious’ and replied

“Of course, it’s because I want to eat lunch with Haley on the yacht. How about you, Haley? Perhaps, you don’t like being on a yacht? I did reserve a restaurant, but since the weather is nice…”

‘I mean, so why do you want to eat lunch with Haley? Why are you even trying? Not only a yacht, but also reserving a restaurant; all to make Haley like you?’ Everyone stared blankly at him, as if they had a scary math problem that no one could understand. Vick laughed awkwardly, “Haha…” and asked again.

“Having a meal on a yacht, that…. is like a date?”

Noah laughed.

“You are saying something strange.”

Everyone relaxed when he said that. They thought they could’ve made a mistake because suddenly he was talking about yachts and restaurants, with such a sweet voice, but Noah kept going.

“Of course, it’s a date.”

'It isn’t ‘like a date,' but ‘it is a date.' Noah tightly grabbed Mason’s hand and smiled.

A date with Haley…., everyone had to ruminate for a while. The person who couldn’t understand the most about what Noah said, was actually Mason himself.

Noah turned to Mason and smiled sweetly as if honey would drip. Mason frowned slightly, gazing into his eyes. It was even more dazzling than when he was facing the camera flashes.

“-Then, it seems like everything is okay. Should we go?”

“-….”

‘Huh? What was okay? Where are you guys going?’ Nobody could speak out.

With his hand held by Noah, Mason was dragged along and got inside the Mercedes.

Even the professional reporters and paparazzi, who never forgot to press their camera buttons, were left standing frozen when the two of them left the filming set.

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It's not 'like a date,' but 'it is a date.'

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