The Stockholm Syndrome

Relentless Tiff...

The staffs buzzed around planning for Taehyung's V-Live that was scheduled shortly. Mostly, there was never a public appearance of celebrities or live telecast without the basic scripts which instructs them about the things that should be covered while interacting with fans. Even the usual live recordings through social networks will instruct the celebrities to evade certain topics. In that sense, Jaejin narrated the do's and don'ts, "I know, V-live is all about reacting to the live comments... But we have predicted a set of questions which will certainly earn its position in the comment section within the first few minutes of going live. So, elaborate your answer on the prepared questions and try to read a very few comments. Don't read all the comments! Because there were never 100% goodness in everything!"

Holding the set of questions in his hand, Taehyung gave a straight face to his remark, 'Don't read all comments'.

"Fine...", Jaejin read his face, "In case you read them, don't reply to them! Especially to those hate comments!" Knowing his temper, Jaejin sighed and continued, "OK, when you reply to them! Don't directly refute their claim! Just go along with them and sarcastically end your sentence with your stand. okay?"

He nodded listening to the usual drill with half closed eyes.

"Don't forget to smile! It's alright if your smile looks too forced while dealing with certain comments, but smile!"

"Yeah... smile, I get it!" He wanted to get over with it.

"Ok... I get that its boring...", Jaejin admitted, "But now for today, I will tell you how to bring up the topic of Sohyun, just in case none of the fans brings it up, okay?". While Jaejin explained further, Taehyung was completely out of the frame. "Oye!", he remarked dropping his formal speech which brought Taehyung back to his senses. "So... what is your problem?"

"Sohyun...", he said concerned.

"Her agency agreed to comply with us! Sohyun-sshi is in script reading. And since it is being recorded, not even their staff can interrupt her to inform about that stalker or our arrangements..."

"Then... not today!"

"What is not today?"

"That new V-Live arrangements..."

Jaejin sighed. "She is left with no choice!" To Taehyung who was still not convinced, Jaejin warned, "Every minute that pass by is a chance of misfortune... Your indecision will give her even a tougher time!"

"But-"

Jaejin interrupted him saying, "Ok, I get it..." "It's normal to feel insecure...", he pulled his leg.

"I never said I'm insecure... Actually, I wanted to do this long time ago! I even do some sneaky SNS updates for her birthday, drama and movie airing dates!"

"Then, let's do it!", he pressed.

Taehyung nodded falling into his trick.

The V-Live soon started. It went on smoothly with the introduction of his upcoming album. Since the V-live happened immediately after the day of song festival, many fans advised him to take rest noticing his eye bags. But he replied, "I'm too excited to sleep! If you ask me why, then I would say I'm yet to recover from the song festival! I enjoyed it a lot! People were so supportive and composed even when they faced an issue..." Immediately many of his fans pointed out the improvisation that Taehyung and Sohyun did on the event and asked if the issue he mentioned was the reason behind it.

Taehyung was evidently surprised and applauded to their sharp observation while praising, "Wow! Bingo!", and then he continued, "But thanks to directors and especially Sohyun-sshi for playing along with my antics, otherwise the improvisation would've been a fiasco! I'm glad she was there...", he commented wearing a wide shy smile. He answered to a comment saying, "'Am I fanboying?', well...", he pursed his lips to curtail his smile, and tried to speak through his sheepish smile but just giggled and evaded the question. "We already emceed together once, and I hope to meet her again." By the time the v-live ended, there were lots of posts on social networking sites, online media and blogs regarding Taehyung's next album and they never forgot to mention his interest in collaborating with Sohyun. And before the news could reach Sohyun, Taehyung wanted to be the first one to disclose it to her. But of course, he lost his chance. As soon as she took her leave from the venue, she switched on her phone to text Taehyung since she never talked with him since she left in the morning. But, before she could type in her messages, her notification got flooded. Her inbox and social accounts were spammed with the posts and messages regarding his V-Live which flustered her. She never expected it; was not prepared for it. Not able to process anything, she logged out of all her accounts and approached her manager who rather seemed calm about the news. Upon reaching her agency, the staff explained the situation to her, after which she never said a word and took her leave.