Chapter 3
Singers, idols, athletes, fashion models, and so on.
People who work in professions commonly called the arts or athletics usually have a hard time handling every schedule on their own.
That’s because they’ve honed their skills in their specialized fields to the extreme.
They’re often more ignorant than ordinary people when it comes to everyday matters, and they’re frequently too busy to handle all the little details.
I’m the same way.
I’ve grown quite experienced in modeling by now, but I’m still hopeless when it comes to schedules, so I always need a manager.
No, maybe I’m hopeless because I always have a manager following me around. Whatever.
When I was young, my manager was my mother, and at one point, my modeling tutor took care of me like a manager.
When I signed with my previous brand, I suddenly started working mostly on the international stage, so I hired a proper manager.
“Ahyun!”
That person is the manager waving her hand right in front of me: Roselia.
She’s a Frenchwoman in her late thirties.
For the record, she’s both my manager and interpreter, fluent in French, Korean, and English.
You might wonder why someone like that is working as a manager.
Roselia is an acquaintance of my mother’s.
After marrying a Korean man and settling in Korea, Roselia was considering her employment options when my mother introduced her to the job.
So she’s both my mother’s friend and my manager.
“Give me the suitcase!”
“Sure.”
I obediently handed the suitcase over at Roselia’s request.
Some people might ask why I don’t pull it myself, or wonder if models are treated like royalty.
Roselia is a former French Army officer who’s about my height and roughly twice my build.
According to her, she gets anxious when little Ahyun, who looks like she might snap if someone so much as pokes her, pulls a suitcase around.
“I’ve taken care of check-in, so Ahyun can rest.”
“Thank you.”
Anyway, it’s just the two of us at the airport right now.
The date is December 24, Christmas Eve.
Normally, I would have been streaming while looking at the brightly colored lights covering the streets online, so what am I doing here?
“Sigh.”
I’m depressed. So depressed.
If this weren’t a party arranged by Andel, I would have turned down anyone’s request without a second thought, but what could I do?
In this industry, models are the ones with less power, while brands call the shots.
If that bothers you, switch careers and become a fashion designer, then launch your own brand.
“It’s been a while since you went to Paris, hasn’t it?”
“Yes. Roselia, you must be happy.”
“I am.”
Roselia, by contrast, seemed excited to be returning to her hometown after such a long time.
Well, Korea was a foreign country to her, so it made sense that she’d enjoy returning home for a holiday like Christmas.
Still, one good thing was that they handled most of the arrangements for us.
Since we were close to signing the contract, just as we were paying close attention to Andel, the brand was also taking good care of us.
They booked everything from business-class tickets for Roselia and me to a luxury hotel.
“This room is quite something.”
“Oh... it’s really nice.”
After more than ten hours in the air, we arrived at the hotel.
We unpacked our luggage while admiring the snowy Christmas cityscape visible through the hotel’s huge windows.
If I weren’t streaming, I might have gotten pretty excited about enjoying a staycation here.
“Are you going to rest in the room?”
“Yes. Would you like to go sightseeing?”
“Hmm, is that okay?”
“I’m not going out anyway, so bring back some snacks on your way.”
Given Roselia’s personality, she probably wanted to go out with me, but I had no intention of doing so, and flopped down on the bed.
If I was going to attend a party in the evening and stream at night, I needed to sleep now.
Besides, I was tired from the long flight.
“Then I’ll be back before dinner.”
“Okay.”
And so, Roselia went out.
I closed my eyes alone on the soft bed.
*
When I opened my eyes again, I heard the hotel door opening.
“Ahyun! Are you awake?”
From the voice, I knew it was Roselia.
I got up from the bedroom and glanced over to see her coming in with her arms full of shopping bags.
“Come sit down! I got back later than I expected!”
“Huh?”
Still half-asleep, I was rubbing my eyes when Roselia grabbed me and pulled me over with the uninhibited physicality typical of Westerners.
“Eek.”
Given the huge difference in our builds, she dragged me straight to the vanity and sat me down there.
“You can’t just go to the party like that, can you?”
“Can’t I just go like this...?”
“No!”
Roselia was a capable woman fluent in three languages, and she was also good at makeup.
Before the party, she skillfully powdered my face with practiced hands.
After dabbing on makeup and putting on the dress she had prepared in advance,
“Ahyun’s the star today!”
Just as Roselia said, I went in confidently, looking ready to eat the party alive, only to have my energy sucked dry for two hours before returning.
“Ahyun, are you okay?”
“....”
It was just about nightfall.
After showering, I collapsed onto the bed without any strength left.
“I have to attend tomorrow too, right?”
“Yes, tomorrow’s the main event.”
The hall had been packed with people, foreign languages had been flying around nonstop, and even people whose faces I didn’t recognize but whose names I’d heard in the industry had kept pretending to know me.
It was a particularly exhausting party, about three times more difficult than an ordinary one.
Today had only been the tutorial party, and the main party was tomorrow.
Honestly, it was impossible not to sigh.
Fortunately, tomorrow’s schedule was in the afternoon, so I didn’t have to go to bed early tonight.
Tap, tap.
Even if I had been told to sleep early, I was planning to stay up late anyway.
I fiddled with my phone, getting ready to start the stream.
As promised, I had to turn on the Christmas Eve livestream.
“I’m going to stream now.”
“That thing you mentioned last time?”
“Yes.”
I had already told Roselia.
Even if no one else knew, Roselia knew that I did internet broadcasts.
Besides, as my manager, she was someone I couldn’t hide it from even if I wanted to.
Anyway, I turned my phone facedown on the table so I wouldn’t appear on camera and tapped the screen to start the stream.
-Pya
-D-d-damn, is this really an IRL stream?
-It’s a little late... It’s late...
-Wayo the Greatㅋㅋ
The viewer count began climbing rapidly, as if they’d been waiting.
After all, what else was there to do on Christmas?
An anniversary for couples was, surprisingly often, just an idle holiday for someone else.
“Hello, everyone. Merry Christmas.”
-This isn’t a recording, right?
-This is really a livestream?
-Do a Chulguㅋㅋ
-Wow, she’s really doing it.
“What... Of course it’s a livestream. More importantly, were you all waiting? The viewer count is climbing at a crazy rate.”
Viewers were joining at twice, no, three or four times the speed they usually did.
Apparently, because I had announced it in advance, existing viewers and community users had been waiting.
“You started the stream?”
Since I was streaming from the bedroom, Roselia seemed fascinated and hovered by the door.
Roselia was an incredibly capable manager who spoke three languages and had near-professional salon-level styling skills.
But her usefulness didn’t end there.
“Yes, I just started.”
“Oh... What’s on the screen?”
“It’s pointed at the table, so don’t worry.”
I had emphasized about eight times beforehand that she absolutely mustn’t mention her name.
She was a smart person, so she wouldn’t forget something I had stressed that much.
What’s more, I had told Roselia in advance that she could come closer when I turned on the livestream.
-?? Who is that?
-It’s a woman hehe
-Who is she?
-She looks foreign.
That was because it would be good for the stream.
Roselia’s voice was fairly ordinary, but the fact that she was a woman was what mattered.
Given the time of year, the viewers trembling with worry and wondering, “Is this bitch Wayo with a man right now?” would feel somewhat reassured.
“She’s my coworker. We’re sharing a room.”
-Does your coworker know you stream?
-Did you come out?ㅋㅋㅋ
-Wow, you’re something elseㅋㅋ
“She doesn’t know much about internet streaming, so it’s fine.”
Roselia knew absolutely nothing about internet broadcasting.
She was an ordinary person about a million light-years removed from the internet, let alone streaming.
Even while I was broadcasting, she probably wouldn’t look up anything about Wayo.
“Interesting….”
In fact, she peeked in a few times before disappearing.
Given Roselia’s regular sleep schedule, she would probably go to bed early.
“More importantly, um, can I call it a day now?”
-??
-?
-I’ve only been on for 20 minutes;
“There’s nothing to do….”
More importantly, I had turned on a livestream and had nothing to do.
Wayo was a variety-game VTuber, after all.
With a computer, I was invincible, Satoru Gojo himself, but without one, I was no different from a child left beside the water.
-Can’t you do a mukbang?
-Late-night snacks, let’s go ㄱㄱ
-Go for a walk outside, please
“Mm, mm….”
Every last option was impossible.
Tomorrow was the main party, so eating late-night snacks would be insane.
As for going for a walk, outside was France, and the viewers didn’t know I was abroad. I hadn’t told them, either.
Of course, even if the viewers knew I was in France on a business trip, the chances of them deducing who I was were practically zero.
Honestly, as long as my face didn’t appear, couldn’t I give them any clue at all without them finding me?
That was how enormous the difference was between Model Ahyun and Wayo.
If I went somewhere and someone posted, “Isn’t Wayo actually a model by day?” the Wayo-dogs would go berserk and beat me black and blue on a rainy day.
Anyway, while I was thinking about what to do, I had a good idea.
“Ah, should I read some submissions?”
If I had no content to produce, I could just leave it to the viewers, right?
Isn’t that why we’re friends?
We’d built a relationship close enough to help each other out on stream and, uh, provide one another with something to do.
-??
-Here comes the Third Technique: Log Throwing.
-What kind of submission?
“Everyone must have a story about watching a stream alone on Christmas Eve, right? Send them in.”
-ㅋㅋ
-You’re insane.
-You fucking asshole.
-Streamer Wayo.
“All right, first come, first served. Donations are hard to check right now, so post them in the café.”
It’s a luxury hotel, so the walls should be soundproof, right?
I hoped I wouldn’t disturb Roselia’s sleep in the next room.
“You say that, but everyone’s already sent one? Let’s see... ‘I’m Park Gyeongsik, 27, a lifelong single living in Incheon....’”
That night, I eventually fell asleep after reading viewers’ long-winded stories until late.
The next day, I attended the main party.
notes
Restored the missing final source line as publishable prose and removed the accidental metadata entry from finalLines. Retained neutral phrasing where gender or subject context was ambiguous.