After Ganghwan left, an oversized silence crawled its way into the office. It was so large that Junmin was pushed into the three-legged chair in the corner of his office. After vitality made rounds and left, his office felt like a foreign space. Junmin decided to escape this place until the stiff atmosphere of the office filled this place again. The three-legged chair wasn’t a chair he could sit comfortably on. He had to pull himself together to maintain balance. He sat upright and thought back to the words that the chatterbox said: “What did you see in me?”. Until just five years ago, Junmin’s eyes discovered the special talent within people as though there was a special filter on his eyes. As the accuracy was pretty high, it was very easy to make a profit. It was five years ago when a problem occurred with the filter that allowed him to continue to score. It was when he was looking at young actors just like normal. His eyes that saw many colors from people suddenly became colorblind. He had finally become able to see the world in the same colors as the others, but the sense of loss was immense. After all, there was nothing more frustrating than a privilege you took for granted being taken away. He felt rather confused, but he soon came up with a counter plan. It was to pick people who had similar characteristics to the ones he nurtured until now. The accuracy was now lower, but he could still maintain his reputation as the ‘master of finding new talent’. Among the child actors he contracted until now, the only one who he had seen the ‘color’ of was Sooil. The rest were those that he picked based on his knowhow, as he did not have any means to see their talent.

Han Maru was one of them, but he was a different case than the rest of them. When he made a pseudo-contract with Maru on a piece of tissue, Junmin did so according to his intuition, which he stopped believing in after losing his ‘colors’. Back then, he thought that relying on intuition should be fine for just one person. Perhaps he was being conceited, thinking that he could find actors even without his magical powers, or perhaps it was his way of teaching the bold kid a lesson. It was true that he was hasty, but the results brought by that were very satisfactory. Maru was smooth-sailing and did not run into swift currents or obstacles. He was a rather pleasant kid. If there were flowers that required the caretaker to switch out the vase, the soil, and water them frequently to grow, there were also some flowers that blossomed even with watering every now and then. Maru was clearly the latter. He was a flower that had the vitality of grass. There was fun in nurturing him, but there was fun in watching him.

Junmin stood up from the wobbly chair and picked up his coat. Staying still was akin to torture. Rather than waiting for sleep that wouldn’t come, it was better to go meet work nearby. He wasn’t someone who ignored the doctor's advice, but he wanted to work busily for today. Even Ganghwan, who wandered around like a loafer, brought work today after all.

“Get the car ready.”

He talked through the interphone before opening the door.

* * *

“I know it’s hot. I really do, but don’t make that tired face in front of me. The stage you are supposed to go on is even hotter. This place doesn’t have lights after all. Once you go on stage after getting fully dressed and putting on thick makeup, even the people who say they never sweat will sweat buckets. Are you going to cringe while acting because it’s hot? Unless you’re an idiot, you can’t do that. Once you’re on stage, or behind the side curtains, watch your expressions. If you go on stage after cringing, even if you smile, the only face you’ll make is a mouth smile with cringing eyes. You have to consciously look out for your facial expressions. Understood?”

Hearing Miso’s merciless words, the club members were unable to even make tired expressions. The seventeen people not participating in the summer competition were watching the others practice nervously from one side. They knew that Miso’s scolding would be directed at them once winter comes.

Miso clapped and said that they would start practice again in three minutes. The heavily sweating juniors all left the hall. Their destination should be the bathroom. Only after pouring cold water over them would they be able to stave off all the heat.

“Aren’t they going to collapse at this rate?”

Maru looked at the ceiling. There was a large hole between the ducts. That was where the air conditioner was supposed to be. He felt like the temperature was getting even higher when he looked at the electrical lines and pipes that were dangling like a tired dog’s tongue. The school building, which was receiving the brunt of the heat of July, was becoming a splendid oven.

“Don’t worry. I might collapse before they do.”

Miso wiped her face with the towel around her neck.

“But hey, what the hell is up with your school’s administration staff? They know full well that we’re practicing here. How could they rip out the air conditioner like that? I want to have a look at the faces of the administrative staff here.”

“As far as I know, teacher Taesik is one of them.”

“My oppa is so pure that he probably doesn’t know that such an evil thing is happening at school.”

“Man, that’s marriage for you. There’s someone always on your side.”

The juniors returned. Water was dripping off their faces regardless of whether they were boys or girls.

“Let’s do one more rehearsal. Everyone here is feeling hot so don’t express it. Get yourself together and we’ll do this without making a mistake. Okay?”

“Yes!”

Maru picked up his script and got away from Miso. The rehearsal began with Miso’s nod. Usually, the rehearsal would continue until the very end without interruptions, but for the past few days, Miso interrupted from time to time to point things out. This was the final check for the performance they were going to hold in just a few days. After this check, MIso would not speak anymore. From then on, the club members would have to discuss among themselves to find the solution.

“Wait. What was that awkward hand gesture just now?”

“Eh? I-I was pointing towards the right direction.”

“I’m not trying to eat you. Don’t shake and say it clearly. Are you going to shake like that on stage too?”

“I’m sorry!”

“Say that again. Why did you do that hand gesture?”

“I was trying to point out the right direction.”

“For who?”

Being pointed out, the junior pointed at another junior who was on stage. This was when two onlookers disappeared into the back of the stage, and that boy was gesturing towards the direction they were going in.

“You didn’t do that before.”

“Ah, yes.”

“Then why did you do it now?”

“Uhm, so….”

Under Miso’s pressure, the junior was unable to speak a word as though his lips were sealed together. Maru groaned lightly. It was easy to tell the temperature of this air conditioning-less hall. He just had to look at the corners of Miso’s eyes. Miso’s eyes were very precise, and they would point upwards along with her thick eyebrows the higher the temperature was. Right now, the corner of her eyes and her eyebrows were as high as they could go. Without any air conditioning to cool her off, that position was very dangerous now. It was a sign that she was about to explode, and a warning for others to evacuate.

“If you are going to do it, you have to do it properly, right?”

Maru stood next to that junior. After checking that Miso’s lips stopped twisting, he continued to speak,

“When you’re practicing, you’ll sometimes forget the basics. I’m the same. However if you forget the basics, there will be no order. Instructor Miso said that actors must be able to control everything about their body down to each strand of hair, right?”

“Yes.”

“It’s true that you have to follow a specified movement path, but actors aren’t machines, are they? If you keep doing this, you will naturally wave your hands and perhaps you might do something like an unplanned action such as ad-libbing. It’s something that happens all the time. However, even those actions have to look natural for the audience and furthermore, have to have meaning. Do you know how you were before?”

The junior looked at Miso before raising his left hand to point left. His arm was right by his side, was not sticking out, and his fingers were curled up. Maru grabbed the junior’s arm and changed his posture. He made the fingers open up wide while extending the arm towards that direction.

“This should be a lot easier for the audience, and your fellow actors to understand, right?”

“Yes.”

“That’s what instructor Miso wanted to tell you. Don’t forget it. Okay?”

“I won’t.”

“Good. The rest was good. Isn’t that right, instructor?”

Miso’s eyebrows slowly fell. It seemed that the barrage of words inside her mouth returned to where they should be. Maru inwardly sighed in relief. If Miso snapped out, the temperature in this already hot hall would have risen by another two degrees centigrade. After all, running caused the heat within the human body to rise.

“You seem caring these days.”

“I thought you wanted that. I’m doing just as I’m told.”

“I thought you’d say a couple words at best, but you’re explaining from A to Z in kind. It makes me wonder if you’re still the cold kid from before.”

“Looks like you didn’t know that even I want to care for my juniors.”

“Like hell you do. But still, it’s a good thing. I’m not going to make a move, so you give them feedback.”

“Isn’t that dereliction of your duty?”

Miso wordlessly pointed at the others. Maru knew that there was no winning when quarrelling with your superior, so he obediently stood in front of everyone.

“From now on, Maru here will be the one coaching you. I’ll set the general direction, but ask Maru for the details. Also, Aram.”

“Yes!”

“Listen to what Maru’s saying carefully and watch out for it when you practice by yourselves, okay?”

“Understood,” Aram replied from the side.

“Then let’s continue, shall we?” Miso said that while leaning against the wall as though it had become much more comfortable for her.

Maru just shrugged.

* * *

“Thank you for your work.”

Miso left in her car. The first year students of the acting club gathered by the school gates also started leaving one by one.

“Maru, where are you going?”

“The hall. I’m going to stay for a little longer.”

“Is there something you need to make?”

“No. I’m just going to practice. I can’t exactly scream my lungs out at home. There’s no better place than the hall if I want to practice with my heart at ease.”

Daemyung took out his phone and looked at it before speaking decisively.

“Can I watch you practice?”

“There’s nothing special. Plus, what are you going to do about her?”

Maru glanced at Jiyoon, who was staring at them by the school gates.

“Ah, right.”

“Don’t ‘ah, right’ me. You’re going to get dumped if you do that. Anyway, get going. She’s waiting.”

Maru pushed Daemyung’s back. Daemyung walked over to Jiyoon while telling him that he’d definitely like to watch next time. Daemyung was incredible in a sense since he put importance on practice even though his ‘youth business’ was still ongoing. After sending Daemyung off, he went up to the 5th floor by himself. He opened the tightly shut door before going inside. The hall still retained its heat and was like a stage after a play had just ended. The thick smell of sweat calmed his mind.

“Good.”

After putting his bag down. He walked slowly along the walls. The sound of his footsteps quietly rang out. At the end of May, he met Haejoo through the videotapes. He also had a glimpse at the secret she held. After hearing that she was conversing with another self that existed in her inner world, Maru talked to himself several times. When acting, the other self naturally came forward, but normally, that self did not reply to him no matter what he said. Once he started acting, he could see that self, but he could not talk to him. If he tried to consciously talk to him, his concentration would waver, breaking the immersion and making him no longer able to detect that other self.

He loosened his feet and slowly started walking. He constantly tried to converse with that other self after practice ended and when he was by himself in this hall. Haejoo said that she improved her acting skills by conversing with her inner self. He would be able to show off better acting skills if that inner self was a target of communication rather than a target of control. He couldn’t be sure about this, but since there was a precedent known as Jung Haejoo, it was worth trying.

“Why don’t you stop blocking me off and answer me for once?”

He quietly talked as he kept walking along the wall like a monk in training.