Tonight, Seoul was too loud. The kind of loud that sank into Ya Hyuk’s bones, vibrating with laughter, flashes, and forced applause. It was Aether Entertainment’s annual winter gala—a red carpet spectacle meant to showcase power, beauty, and survival. Ya Hyuk stood at the center of it all beneath a thousand white lights, the cameras like a storm around him.

It had been eight months since the world took what was his and turned it into a headline. Eight months since he’d watched everything crumble in the space of a single photograph—the kind that froze a year of quiet, secret love into evidence of betrayal. He had seen your face on every screen for weeks after: the model who “corrupted” the idol, the man who “should have known better.” He remembered how the brands dropped, how the comment sections burned, how you disappeared from public view for a while—and how he had to pretend it didn’t destroy him.

And now, he was here, smiling for the cameras that once devoured his heart.

Ya Hyuk’s expression was flawless—practiced, polite, empty. He had learned how to curve his lips just enough to seem warm, how to tilt his chin toward the flashes so his jaw caught the light, how to survive under their gaze without letting them see the ghost behind his eyes. NEON9 stood beside him in a perfect line, glittering perfection molded by the industry’s hand. The questions came, the lights flared—and all he could hear was his pulse, uneven and hollow.

He tugged gently at the choker around his neck—a layered crystal band that suddenly felt too tight. The crowd wanted him radiant, untouchable, alive. But he had never felt more haunted.

The last time he’d seen you was at the height of the scandal—the day the silence became official. The press statement. The denial. The faint tremor in his own voice when he said we’re just friends while knowing you were somewhere listening.

And now, as NEON9 began to move down the line, waving for the photographers, Ya Hyuk turned slightly—and froze.

There, across the crowd of executives and flashing cameras, stood you.

For a heartbeat, the noise around him dissolved. The laughter, the applause, the camera shutters—all of it fell away. He could only see you. You stood tall, confident, your tux immaculate under the light. Your broad shoulders filled the suit effortlessly, your hands clasped loosely in front of you, the kind of calm that came only from years of knowing how to perform for cameras. Your expression was unreadable—that same distant composure that used to drive him insane because he knew what lay behind it. Because he had been the only one who ever got to see it crack.

Eight months.

Eight months of pretending he’d moved on.

Eight months of silence that hurt worse than any words could.

Ya Hyuk’s breath caught. His fingers twitched at his side, aching to reach out, to do anything but stand still. But he couldn’t. He could already feel the cameras turning in his direction, sensing tension the way sharks sensed blood.

He tried to look away. Remind himself he was on stage. But before he could, you moved—just slightly—a turn of the head, a shift of the gaze.

And then their eyes met.

It hit him like a bruise—sharp, sudden, impossible to hide. The lights flashed, the crowd roared, but all he saw was you. For the first time all evening, his smile faltered, and the mask cracked. Just for a moment.

His heart slammed against his ribs. His lips parted—not to speak, just to breathe. The name he wasn’t allowed to say lingered on the tip of his tongue, heavy and forbidden.

Then the cameras flashed again. Ya Hyuk swallowed hard, forcing the smile back into place, but the damage was done. The look, the flicker—it would be everywhere by morning.

He took one slow step forward before he even realized it.

And stopped.

Because you had looked away first.

His throat tightened as the noise of the gala rushed back in. He stood beneath the lights, still facing you even as your gaze drifted away, his voice barely a breath beneath the cameras’ hum.

“…You still can’t look at me, can you?”