Chapter 1: The Exhibitionist's Revenge
The noise hit him first—a solid wall of bass and shrieking laughter that made the floor vibrate through his dress shoes. Donghae adjusted his cufflinks, a pointless gesture, and wished he’d begged off with a headache. The football victory was last week. This was just an excuse.
He stepped into the penthouse ballroom and the scent of expensive cigar smoke and spilled champagne wrapped around him. Neon banners from the game cast a sickly green and gold glow over everything, bleeding into the artificial fog hanging near the twenty-foot ceiling. He scanned the crowd, looking for Miyoung’s familiar, calm smile.
He didn’t find it.
What he found, instead, was himself. Dozens of himself.
Giant, high-definition projections covered every major wall. On screen, in breathtaking clarity, was the university cheerleading gym. And in the center, moving with a powerful, impossible grace, was Lee Hyukjae.
Donghae’s drink felt suddenly heavy in his hand.
It wasn’t a public performance. It was private practice footage. He could see the sweat gleaming on her temples, the focused set of her mouth as she launched into a series of dizzying flips and extensions. The camera followed her intimately, like a devoted audience of one. The music was low, just the sound of her feet hitting the mat and her controlled breaths. Then, as the sequence ended, she’d look directly into the lens, her chest rising and falling, a slow, private smile touching her lips.
“This one’s for you, Donghae,” she’d whisper, her voice a little rough from exertion, before spinning away into the next routine.
The words looped. On the east wall, she finished a backflip. For you, Donghae. On the south wall, she held a perfect arabesque. For you, Donghae. It was inescapable. The entire party was breathing in time with her footage.
“What is this?” he muttered, his charm evaporating under a cold drip of humiliation.
A vise-grip on his bicep. Miyoung materialized beside him, her fingers digging in. Her sweet, placid mask was still on, but it was cracking at the eyes. “She’s insane,” Miyoung hissed, her voice a low wire of fury. “This is a violation. You need to have her stopped.”
“How?” Donghae asked, stunned. “It’s her brother’s penthouse.”
“Then make her stop!” Miyoung’s whisper was sharp. “She’s doing this for you.Everyone knows it. Look at them.”
He did. A group of guys from the team were watching the north wall projection, beers frozen halfway to their mouths. One elbowed another, nodding in Donghae’s direction. A flash of heat climbed his neck.
“She’s just seeking attention,” he said, more to himself than to Miyoung. “Loud. Obvious.”
“Three months.”
The new voice was cool, calm, and came with two glasses of champagne. Kyuhyun, Hyukjae’s twin, offered one to Donghae. He didn’t smile. His expression was one of polite, razor-edged challenge. “She spent three months choreographing these routines.Filming them. Editing them.” He took a sip, his gaze never leaving Donghae’s. “The least you can do is watch every second.”
Donghae accepted the glass, his mind reeling. Three months? The scale of it, the sheer audacious effort, left him winded. This wasn’t a slipped note or a bold wink. This was a documented siege.
“Where is she?” Donghae asked, his voice tighter than he intended.
“Where do you think?” Kyuhyun nodded toward the center of the room.
There she was. A vortex of energy in a sea of black cocktail dresses. Hyukjae was wearing crimson, a slash of color that seemed to draw all the neon light to her. She was laughing, her head thrown back, surrounded by a circle of friends. Yoona was beside her, shaking her head as if in defeat, but grinning.
As if sensing the weight of his stare, Hyukjae’s laughter faded. She turned. Her eyes found his across the crowded, noisy room. For a second, the loud, boisterous cheerleader was gone. Her expression was unguarded, hopeful, and terrifyingly vulnerable. She raised her own glass a fraction of an inch in a tiny, private toast.
Then someone said something to her, and the moment shattered. The bright, voluminous persona snapped back into place. She winked, exaggerated, and turned away, but the afterimage of that raw hope stuck to Donghae’s skin.
“She’s not what you think she is,” Kyuhyun said quietly, finishing his champagne.
“And what do I think she is?” Donghae snapped, finally looking away from her.
“Easy,” Kyuhyun said, the word a verdict. “You think she’s easy, and loud, and too much. You’re wrong on all counts.” He plucked the full glass from Donghae’s numb fingers. “You don’t have to like her. But you will watch. Consider it your penance for being so willfully blind.”
Kyuhyun melted back into the crowd. Miyoung was still glued to Donghae’s side, her breath coming in short, angry puffs. “He can’t talk to you like that. Who do they think they are? This is… it’s aggressive. It’s cheap.”
But it wasn’t cheap. That was the unsettling part. The quality of the footage, the artistry of the routines… it was meticulously, expensively crafted. This was a declaration he didn’t know how to answer.
His eyes were dragged back to the south wall. A new sequence played. Hyukjae was tumbling, a series of powerful handsprings. The camera closed in on her face mid-rotation. Pure determination.Absolute focus. The whisper came again, soft as a secret in the noisy room. For you, Donghae.
He felt a bizarre, unwelcome pull. A need to see what came next. What else had she made for him?
Miyoung tugged on his arm. “Let’s go. Now. This is humiliating.”
He didn’t move. He was watching the screen. Hyukjae had finished her tumbling pass and was now standing still, catching her breath, looking straight at him through the lens. She smiled, a little shy this time, and mouthed the words again, silently.
For the first time, Donghae wondered what it cost her to be this loud.This obvious. What if it wasn’t a tactic, but a translation? What if all this noise was just a clumsy attempt to be heard over the roar of his own assumptions?
He took a step forward, not toward the exit, but deeper into the room, toward the center where the crimson dress was spinning.
“Donghae!” Miyoung’s voice was a sharp, forgotten thing behind him.
He didn’t stop. The party crowd seemed to blur at the edges. His world had narrowed to the projections on the walls and the woman in the middle of the room who had built them.He had to know. He had to see what was on the next tape.