Hyuk eagerly opened the care package that Jaemi sent him. She didn’t send one often, but when she did, it’d be full of snacks, comics, and anything else that he didn’t even know he wanted. He pulled out two bags of his favorite candy, some other snacks, a hand knitted scarf and a matching pair of mittens that her mom probably made for him, a comic book, a calendar, and a pair of Adidas sweatpants. He immediately popped a piece of candy into his mouth and sorted through the rest of the contents of the package. He opened the comic book and a note fell out. He laughed to himself and almost choked on the piece of candy when he read it.

                “You looked here first, didn’t you? My mom made me send this. You’re annoying. Love, Jaemi (but you’re only allowed to call me princess Jaemi)

                While the following month was mostly full of diligent studying for Hyuk, it was full of awkward moments for Jaemi and Hongbin. At first, they just didn’t talk to each other at all unless they were talking to each other as their characters, which was fine with the both of them. The director wished that they’d be more open to each other for the sake of their on screen relationship, but he didn’t want to cause trouble for the idol.

                Honestly, they probably would’ve went the whole time it took to shoot the drama without talking to each other if it came down it, but unfortunately for Hongbin, they were forced to interact around the third week of filming. Jaemi’s brother wrote an OST, which was intended to be given to a female idol to sing for more publicity for the drama, but Jonghwan insisted that Jaemi sang it. Jonghwan ended up having to turn it into a duet for Jaemi and Hongbin as a compromise.

                Maybe it wouldn’t have been so bad if the lyrics weren’t so romantic and nostalgic. The whole song was about the good moments of a failed relationship. Jaemi actually heard this song when Jonghwan first wrote it in his first year of college, but it sounded a lot better rewritten as a duet now.

                “What if I don’t know how to answer a question, eonnie?” Jaemi asked Soeun while they both got their makeup done for the press conference. Jaemi was especially nervous because she’d never, in her entire life, had to do anything like this. She never liked talking about herself, especially in front of a lot of people.

                “If you get asked a tricky question, just find a way to direct it to me and I’ll take care of it for you,” Soeun replied and grabbed Jaemi’s hand. Jaemi smiled at her, totally thankful to have Soeun helping her out so much. Miyoung was inwardly jealous that Soeun easily become Jaemi’s non-blood related sister. Things used to be quite awkward between her and Jaemi, considering that Jaemi was completely wasted when they met for the first time.

                Miyoung and Yeona watched the press conference from the sidelines. From their point of view, everything seemed to be going fine, but Jaemi and Hongbin were both completely freaking out on the inside. Jaemi, because of typical nervousness, and Hongbin, because he thought he heard a reporter say something about dating rumors earlier.

                As the press conference went on, the both of them began to feel more at ease. The reporters just loved Jaemi. Even Hongbin was surprised by how easy going and positive she was portraying herself as. She laughed, smiled, and made jokes with everybody. She wasn’t ever this sociable.

                “So, Jaemi, you and Hongbin must be close from working together. Are you close with any of the other VIXX members?” a reporter with a hidden agenda asked.

                Not realizing how big of a grave she was about to dig for herself, Jaemi answered, “Well, we all went to high school together so we’re all friends, but I guess I’ve always been a bit better friends with Hakyeon and Jaehwan.” Hongbin inwardly scoffed at her answer, but outwardly he kept a smile on his face and nodded to confirm her statement.

                “How close would you say you are?” the same reporter asked. Hongbin got a bad feeling from this reporter, but he didn’t know how to communicate that to Jaemi with everybody watching, so he just hoped that she wouldn’t say anything incriminating.

                “Um, well, we were all good friends in high school but when they became trainees we all got really busy and we didn’t start talking to each other again until recently,” she explained calmly.

                “So is it true that you are in a relationship with a VIXX member?” the reporter asked.

                A wave of shocked gasps and frantic shuttering of cameras followed. Every reporter shouted at her to give a statement. Jaemi felt like she was going to throw up. Of course it wasn’t true, but all the flashing lights and the loud voices made her feel so small and helpless. She couldn’t seem to say anything; all she could manage were a few shallow breaths before Hongbin stepped up and denied the allegations. The reporters went even crazier, asking for Jaemi’s statement, which made her feel even more incapable of talking.

                “Thank you, we will not be taking any more questions,” Hongbin’s manager stated formally. Everybody got up and took a bow before walking off the platform.

                Once they were out of sight from the reporters and their cameras, Hongbin confronted Jaemi.

                “What were you doing? Why didn’t you say something about Hyuk? You could’ve saved us all, but no. You just stood there like an idiot and now we’re going to have to deal with this later,” he accused.

                Jaemi teared up and avoided eye contact with him. “I-I’m sorry. You’re right. P-Please stop yelling at me,” she stammered nervously.

                Hongbin immediately backed down. It wasn’t like her at all to act so weak and fragile. He scanned her face and wondered what happened to her in the three years they hadn’t seen each other to make her like this now. It took all of his will power to not give her a hug and apologize for raising his voice at her.

                His manager called him to leave, and so he took one last sad look at her before leaving. He wondered why the reporter would’ve thought that she was dating a VIXX member in the first place. He didn’t follow her on twitter or Instagram anymore, but while they were dating, she posted a lot of things about their relationship that she had long since taken down. He wondered why there wasn’t any proof of her relationship with Hyuk for the reporters to use. And he wondered why she just didn’t say anything. Deep down inside, under all of his anger towards her, he hoped that they broke up. He didn’t think he’d ever not be in love with her.

                Later, a story came out about Jaemi possibly dating a VIXX member. There was a picture of her visiting her friend, Jia, who happened to live in the same building as VIXX, and a picture of her holding hands with Hyuk, but it only showed Hyuk’s backside. There was also a picture of somebody who looked like Ravi with his arm around a girl who didn’t really look like her. Luckily, there weren’t any pictures of her talking to them when they were in New York. VIXX and Jaemi had to release their official statements about the subject. All of the reporters were going crazy with the stories and fans began speculating about what the truth really was.

                “This afternoon, Ms. Jo was unprepared and overwhelmed by the persistence of the press and she apologizes for any confusion she may have caused. Her statement is that she is not dating a VIXX member, but her current boyfriend was a very good friend of the VIXX members when they were in high school. Ms. Jo also confirms that that picture is of her and her boyfriend entering the café, but that was not her in the picture with Ravi. She also confirmed that she was not visiting the VIXX dorms, but she was visiting a friend who lives in the same building. Ms. Jo hopes there will not be any more misunderstandings in the future. Thank you,” a representative of Jaemi’s company released. 

                Hongbin read her statement a dozen times. “Her current boyfriend.” She was still dating Hyuk, which made him all the more confused and annoyed.

                Jaemi read what her company told the public. They left out the part about her being friends with VIXX and being happy with Hyuk and not having the slightest intention of dating a VIXX member. She felt a bit relieved that her company decided not to reveal much about Hyuk. She liked keeping as many things to herself as possible.

                “While it is true that Ms. Jo and the VIXX members attended the same high school, none of the members are in or have been in a relationship with Ms. Jo. They have only recently been getting to know each other better through Hongbin and Ms. Jo working together on the drama, A Sister’s Revenge. The members would like to thank their fans for all the love and support they’ve received and apologize for worrying their fans,” a Jellyfish Entertainment representative released.

                Jaemi scoffed when she read VIXX’s statement. She understood why they’d lie about her never dating Hongbin, but she thought they probably should’ve just not mentioned it in the first place. They didn’t mention anything about Ravi and his girlfriend, so why would they have even brought up the possibility that she dated one of them in the past? She checked to see if Hyuk replied to her text and she was extremely disappointed to see that he hadn’t. She was so tired and all she wanted to do was complain to Hyuk about getting yelled at again for causing trouble, but Hyuk apparently had some big test or something that he really needed to study for. She sighed deeply and went to cross out today’s date in her calendar. There were exactly 34 days left until Hyuk came back.

                Just then, her phone started ringing. She rushed back to where she dumped her phone, but nobody was calling her on that phone. She turned around and picked up her work phone from the coffee table. The color drained from her face when she saw that Shin was calling.

                She quickly answered the call, knowing that he hated waiting. She didn’t say anything and just waited for him to start talking.

                “Noona, how could you lie to everybody like that? I’m not friends with VIXX,” he said cutely.

                “You’re not my boyfriend,” she stated. On their first “date,” as soon as she realized that it was a date, she told him that she had a boyfriend, but he said he didn’t care. He told her he would win her over one day.

                “Oh, come on noona. I think you’re just doing all this to make me jealous,” he asserted. She gagged at the thought. “But I forgive you, noona. Let’s go out tonight.”

                “No, I’m not home. I’m spending the night at a friend’s house,” she lied.

                He sighed, not thinking anything of it, even though she told him that literally everytime he asked her to go in public with him. “Fine, noona. Some other time then. You know it’s kind of hot when you play hard to get.” Jaemi nearly threw up in . She wanted to hang up on him, but she was never supposed to hang up first.

                “Anyways, I’ll see you soon, noona,” he said before hanging up. Jaemi threw her phone across the room, not caring if it broke. Her sponsor would pay to fix it. She sat down on the ground, buried her face in her hands, and cried. Everything was starting to be too much for her. All she wanted was for Hyuk to tell her that everything was going to be ok, but he was too busy to do that.