Chapter Text
"Eyebrows seemingly drawn by a single, uninterrupted stroke of a famed artist's brush; a nose and a chin shaped in perfect angles that defied attempts to measure them through mere devices of men; a pair of deep eyes seemingly carved out of a beautiful jewel containing all the misfortunes found in this world."
- Kim Dokja, ORV, speaking about Yoo Joonghyuk.
"...her eyes were dark and haunting, and her hair was as black as a raven's wing."
- Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
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"Cut!"
Dokja breathed a sigh of relief, then disentangled his limbs from Joonghyuk so quickly that he toppled onto the floor, the jewelry that had been draped over both of them falling onto the ground with a crash that Dokja ignored in his rush to leave.
The director, the sweet, completely oblivious director had had Dokja practically lie over Joonghyuk. Dokja would have run out of the room, right there and then if he knew that said position would last for an hour and a half.
"You're that eager to get away from me?"
No, Dokja thought. That's my problem.
Yoo Joonghyuk stared at him thoughtfully. Was he trying to give Dokja cardiac arrest? Was it fun for him, to torment the awkward college boy who had no place here, in a photo shoot for the most famous haute couture company in all of Korea?
It must have been, because there was no other reason why Joonghyuk would've asked to partner with Dokja on this shoot.
Han Sooyoung had even told him so, when she had brought over Murim dumplings and chicken broth, along with plenty of alcohol. He realized, too late, that Sooyoung was being unusually nice to him and trying to butter him up. Kim Dokja hadn't known this yet, however, so he had welcomed Sooyoung with open arms and she had backstabbed him.
Dokja had very few memories of the night, which could have been because of the wine, or, as Sooyoung had gleefully informed him later, the multiple body shots.
"Sooyoung-ah," Dokja slurred, star-fished on the floor, face down and - fuck, he desperately needed to clean his floor. There was something mossy growing beneath the cracks, and Dokja had even plucked it out to see if it was edible. Vegetables were too expensive for a college student, especially one whose mom was in prison, and even more so for a literature major.
"Yes, Dokja?"
He pointed a finger accusingly at her.
"You were trying to get me drunk!"
Han Sooyoung snorted.
"No shit, Sherlock. What do you think I brought alcohol for? It was to get both of us drunk."
Dokja frowned sympathetically. He knew nothing about the modeling industry, but he had heard enough from Han Sooyoung to ensure he would never work for an agency. "Tough time at work?"
"You have no clue." She sprawled on the ground next to him, facing the ceiling. It was nice to talk through the night again, like when they were teenagers. Dokja, although he would never tell her, saw Han Sooyoung as his annoying older sister; blunt, but ultimately caring.
"This model - this fucking dumbass - I mean, of course - "
"The "man carved from marble"?"
As ill-informed as Dokja was, even he knew about Yoo Joonghyuk. The twenty-three year old who had the modeling world wrapped around his finger, who had famously been recruited for rivaling car companies' commercials, both sides upping the bid until the agency Joonghyuk had been working for at the time walked away several hundred thousand dollars richer. Yoo Joonghyuk, the enigma who would only sign on for agencies for a maximum of two months at a time, slipping out of the poor company's fingers as soon as they had acquired a new opportunity for him. He was the sole person in Korea who could get away with turning down ads for Ferraris. Ferraris.
For some reason, he felt a strange twinge of affection when he heard Joonghyuk's name, an ache in his heart that reminded him, oh, there used to be something here. He attributed the feeling to a combination of sleep deprivation and over a year long dry spell.
"Yes, Kim Dokja. That Yoo Joonghyuk has agreed to sign with our agency under one condition."
Dokja sat up and got a head rush from the vertigo. Sooyoung had complained about Joonghyuk's stubbornness for years, not for some little startup when he had the top companies practically eating out of his hand.
"That's amazing, Sooyoung-ah!"
Sooyoung responded with a long, extended sigh that Dokja heard often from her. It meant Why are you such a dumbass, Dokja?
"Well, yes, I am amazing. The agency would've collapsed without me there, clearly. And you're happy for me, right, Dokja?"
Why did Dokja get the feeling that no matter what he answered, he was going to be roped into something terrible?
"Yes," he replied cautiously. "That is what I said, yes."
"Well," Sooyoung said, "Then you'll be happy to do me a little favor, right?"
Silence.
"Sooyoung-ah, did you kill Yoo Joonghyuk?"
She spat out her wine.
"No-what the fuck, Dokja? I can't go to prison!"
"For the record, I could absolutely see you losing your patience and stabbing him with a pen."
She considered this.
"Fair, but if I was going to ask for anyone's help to haul the body and dump it in the river, I wouldn't ask you, scrawny. I would ask Sangah."
Dokja sputtered, face turning red.
"She's not stronger than me!"
He'd known that he was lying as soon as the words came out of his mouth. Dokja had made friends with Yoo Sangah in one of his psychology classes, and had introduced her to his acquaintances, Huiwon and Hyunsung. They had taken a liking to her immediately. It turned out that Sangah did karate on the side, and that was...worrying, if only because Sooyoung had been wanting to learn karate and it was likely that she might have rubbed Sangah the wrong way.
Sooyoung was a massive flirt, and had convinced (read: forced) Dokja into introducing her to Sangah.
Surprisingly, the two women had gotten along well. A little too well, in Dokja’s opinion, because it wasn’t long before they were comfortable enough with each other to work together in setting up Dokja on blind dates.
However, their efforts were in vain. Sooyoung had texted Dokja on not one, not two, but three separate occasions to meet up with her at a café where there was a bachelor awaiting him.
Dokja did what he always did when confronted with a man he had even a chance of becoming involved with. He ran.
Dokja forgave Sooyoung and Sangah, though, because they were ambushing him with good intentions, and had afterwards been guilted into doing them several favors in return for the time the two spent arranging the dates.
Sooyoung was busy, of course, and Sangah was even more so.
They worked at the same modeling agency, the former as an agent/executive and the latter as a makeup artist.
Dokja had been drawn to them because of this - because they had purpose. Call it a result of childhood trauma stemming from overanalyzing both of his parents, but he liked people who were easy to read, with easily defined motives.
Dokja felt guilty about this, as if he were taking advantage of the people in his life and leeching off of their drive.
He’d told Huiwon, who was currently working at a bar to pay for law school, about his shameful guilt.
“That’s fucking stupid, Dokja. You’re too nice, and I’m saying this while dating Hyunsung.”
Dokja had tilted his head in confusion.
“But Hyunsung is a teddy bear.”
“Exactly.”
That was the last that they had spoken of the topic.
Now, Sooyoung, his annoying friend and confidant, who had broken Dokja's door to help him. She had begged him, pleaded with him to get up and open the door, but he was dehydrated and only half-awake from the pain meds.
He couldn’t, and Sooyoung had rammed into his door until it had caved in under the pressure of her kicks. Afterwards, she had force-fed him chicken soup and chocolate. Sooyoung was the sole person he knew who had broken into his home and nursed him back to help, all while never dropping her signature sarcasm.
Sooyoung, who had tensed her shoulders and physically braced herself before asking him to do her a favor, once again.
“Joonghyuk-ssi’s one condition is that you model with him for the shoot.”
Dokja started laughing. “No, Sooyoung, really.”
She looked dead into his eyes. So, she wasn’t joking then.
“Oh, no. Yeah, I’m not…well, I’m not a model.”
Sooyoung squinted at him, reappraising features which Dokja had never thought much of.
“It’s not bad,” she said hesitantly, and Dokja thought it ridiculous that Sooyoung thought that he cared about his appearance at all.
“But you don’t understand why Joonghyuk-ssi would request me?”
“…yes.”
“Just so you know,” Dokja continued, “I’m not in a secret relationship with him or anything.”
Sooyoung seemed annoyed now, which didn’t make sense, because although Joonghyuk was out of his league, Dokja didn’t consider it impossible that he would stumble upon Joonghyuk in a coffee shop and strike up a conversation with him.
“Obviously, I know that.”
The added “obviously” was rather insulting, to be honest.
Sooyoung clarified her previous statement.
“He’s dating Lee Seolhwa.”
That was perfectly fine with Dokja, and it made sense for Korea’s top model to be in a relationship with Korea’s most popular actress. Known for her interpretations in playing tragic widows and imperious queens in adaptations of classic dramas, Lee Seolhwa had been frequently seen with Yoo Joonghyuk at several fundraising events - parties for the rich to feel good about their generosity, as Dokja thought of them. Admittedly, he might’ve been jealous of the wealth that some possessed, and may have been pissed off that the money was spent on one-use garments and new ways to starve fashionably for weight loss.
Dokja suspected that he would be very bad at being wealthy. He didn’t mind.
Sooyoung was staring at him, and Dokja realized that he hadn’t continued explaining why he wasn’t fit to model.
“And I hate rich people, and handsome guys. Joonghyuk-ssi is both.”
"Alright, alright. Would it help if I told you how much you would be paid to model with him?"
Dokja didn't believe that any sum of money would convince him. He told Sooyoung so, and she responded with the salary.
"Three hundred million won."
Sooyoung considered rising the salary by a few million more. They had Yoo Joonghyuk - the hype around the product and who was featured in the advertisement would garner more influence than their last five ads combined.
"When do I start?"
Sooyoung broke into a wide grin. "Tomorrow. Show up at two p.m."
Even ignoring the money, the money that would pay for the rent and groceries and school for the next five years, the relief on her face made it worth it to do the shoot.
Dokja had thought he wouldn't ever regret his decision. How hard was it to sit and look pretty? He'd done worse for much, much less.
Well, fuck the Dokja of last night, because it turns out that it is very hard to keep a straight face while sitting on his crush's lap. Even worse was that the directors could tell that Dokja was uncomfortable around Joonghyuk, and kept having to remind him that "they weren't asking him to shit, so he shouldn't look this constipated". Despite how often this phrase was repeated, it wasn't effective the first time, and not the thirty-one times it was repeated after.
So, on the fifth take, Dokja looked up at Joonghyuk, trying to catch his attention to ask him why Dokja, of all people, had been chosen, only to see that Joonghyuk was staring at him with half-lidded eyes. The shock of it stunned Dokja too much to speak.
And Joonghyuk - Joonghyuk was completely unreadable after that, as if he didn't realize that Dokja didn't recognize Joonghyuk and would like an explanation right there and then.
As it turned out, it was very, very hard to act calm when Korea's sexiest man (voted as such for the sixth year in a row) kept staring at Dokja with bedroom eyes, and Dokja underwent all the humiliation of being a teen all over again.
Cold sweat, self-consciousness, and most of all, the constant feeling of being on pins and needles when pretty boys did as little as brush past him in the hallway.
Well, this was the Supreme King of pretty boys, and Dokja had been lying in between his legs for over an hour.
By the end of the shoot, Kim Dokja knew two things for a fact:
1. Giving Joonghyuk the equivalent of a lap dance from moving around too much hadn't been in the job description, unintentional though it was.
2. Han Sooyoung was so dead once Dokja got his hands on her.