101 Ways to Pretend│Taegyu

Chapter 2

The god awful ringing of his phone woke Taehyun from his peaceful slumber, the headache from the previous night somewhat subsided. Rubbing his eyes, he picked up his phone in a groggy state, squinting to see the contact name. It was Soobin- but why would his manager call him on the weekend? Taehyun was only the anchor for the weekday 9 pm news, so this phone call surely had nothing to do with work. Still, in a daze, he brought the phone up to his ear.

"You didn't tell me you and Choi Beomgyu were dating??"

"Wait... what?"

"Did you not hear? He confirmed that you guys were dating like a few hours ago-"

Taehyun's stomach dropped.

--

A few hours ago

Beomgyu woke up, with his head throbbing and a hangover knocking on his door. Shoving the pukish feeling back down his throat, he threw the covers off himself and got out of bed. The previous night's events were nothing but a blur; he only recollected coming back home and passing out. He did remember meeting Taehyun, though not much after that.

He crossed his fingers, hoping he hadn't done anything embarrassing, and picked up his phone.

Immediately, he was met with messages from almost everyone at his company, his phone blowing up to the point where it almost started glitching. Beomgyu's face fell in shock, and he hesitantly tapped the first message he saw, coming from his manager.

Yeonjun

What the hell did you do last night??

(1 link attached)

He clicked the link. It couldn't be that bad right?

ACTOR CHOI BEOMGYU SPECULATED TO BE DATING ANCHOR KANG TAEHYUN?

Beomgyu was so, so wrong. The article contained a photo of the two of them face to face at yesterday's afterparty, Beomgyu leaning forward and smiling at Taehyun like he was the only person in the universe.

The photo was beautiful, to be honest. The wind blowing in their hair, Taehyun's blush, the skyline behind them- Beomgyu kind of wanted to frame it, but he immediately shook his head at the thought. What was he doing?

Biting his lip in nervousness, he pressed the call button next to Yeonjun's name. However, he very deeply regretted doing so, after hearing the string of curses and profanities that came from the other end the moment the call went through. He remained silent and let Yeonjun finish his rant, picking up fragments of sentences that were not curses, things like:

"This is why I never leave you alone at parties!"

"I let you roam around freely for one night and this is what happens??"

"Choi Beomgyu I am going to chop your head off when I see you just wait-"

He slightly flinched at the last one, but deep down he knew Yeonjun was all bark and no bite. When the elder finally finished his outburst, Beomgyu spoke up.

"So... what do I do?" he asked, pulling the phone away from his ear slightly just in case the other would blow his ear off once more, but the shouting never came.

"You know what... just wait at home I'll come and pick you up. And if you meet any reporters, do NOT say a single word. You hear me?"

That proved to be a lot harder than he thought.

Beomgyu was met with a horde of paparazzi when walking out his front door, all with flashing cameras and pestering questions. The actor wasn't very good with handling paparazzi, despite all his previous years of experience- he struggled to hold himself back every time when it came to answering questions, just because he wanted to get a rise out of the people with his answers.

There was nothing Beomgyu enjoyed more than spitting out lies and seeing who would actually believe them, especially around people who seemed to care more about his life than their own. Though he managed to control it most of the time, he felt like having a little fun today.

All press is good press, they said, and Beomgyu certainly believed in that saying.

So when Beomgyu heard the question "Is it true that you're dating Kang Taehyun?", he couldn't help but stop in his tracks, and he couldn't help but answer. And the one word he said would determine the make or break of his career. So, Beomgyu took a gamble. He took a gamble just to see where it would get him, and he answered:

"Yes."