I'm an Unknown Actress, But Everyone Knows Me

The first day focused on safe indoor shooting.

For Lee Seohae and Gam Seonghwan’s scene, a light everyday-life sequence was chosen as the very first shoot.

Inside the old sundae soup diner, the extras were already seated in advance.

“Let’s check the blocking one more time!”

Shin Seojin and I began the camera rehearsal.

Gam Seonghwan brings Lee Seohae here, saying he’ll buy her a meal in return for helping with the investigation. It’s his regular place near the police station.

“Seojin, you open the door first here, come in, then look back at Yeoreum. Yeoreum, you come in after him and look over here once.”

Director Park’s coaching continued. I nodded.

“Here we go-!”

Director Park took his seat in front of the monitor, and Shin Seojin and I waited outside the restaurant for the signal.

“Ready!”

At moments like this, everyone breathes as one. The person holding the boom mic, the one operating the camera, and the ones acting.

I drew in the trembling breath before the start—

“Action!”

—and let it out.

“This place doesn’t look like much, but the taste is seriously no joke. Huge portions too. More than anything, it comes out really fast. It’s not just any sundae soup place.”

Clack-.

Gam Seonghwan slid open the diner’s creaking door, which didn’t open smoothly at first. At once, the noisy bustle from inside spilled out.

At that sensation, Lee Seohae didn’t immediately follow behind him. Instead, she looked past his shoulder into the interior.

“What are you doing?”

Half-turning toward the Seohae who hadn’t entered yet, Gam Seonghwan smiled with easy warmth.

Under his urging gaze, Lee Seohae slowly followed after him.

The open door bothered her, so she reached out and quietly slid it shut from the inside.

“Auntie! Two specials!”

Gam Seonghwan called out loudly enough for the people in the kitchen to hear.

‘He really practiced a lot....’

I had already felt it during the script reading, but there was absolutely none of Taejin’s presence from 〈The Great Garland〉.

Not even a trace remained of that neat attitude that wore suits so well. He had even added a scar above one eyebrow, roughening himself up.

With quick hands, Shin Seojin pulled out a couple of tissues from the dispenser on the table.

Then, with one hand, he skillfully grabbed the large water bottle and drizzled water over them.

‘That’s ad-lib.’

The sight of him wiping down the sticky, poorly cleaned table with a makeshift wet wipe made him look like a true longtime regular of this sundae soup place.

He really didn’t look like Shin Seojin at all.

He was Detective Gam himself.

I sat upright at a proper distance, looking at Gam Seonghwan in front of me, then briefly glanced sideways at the neighboring table.

The extras sitting there noticed my gaze.

“Uh... this really must be a famous place.”

“Looks like it. So many people.”

Lines that weren’t in the script.

The extras tossed out awkward fragments of conversation at random just to create the sound of noisy chatter.

But I focused on their actions.

‘This is where Director Park’s newly created Lee Seohae begins.’

When Lee Seohae noticed someone at the next table—clearly the subordinate—setting a spoon for their superior, she copied the action as if only just remembering it.

She pulled out a tissue and placed it by Gam Seonghwan’s right hand, then carefully aligned the spoon and chopsticks before setting them down.

“Oh. Thank you.”

Soon, bowls of sundae soup were placed on the gleaming table that had been wiped with the damp tissue.

Watching the steam curl from the hot soup, Gam Seonghwan busied himself.

When he added salted shrimp, a moment later Lee Seohae did the exact same.

When he added chives, a moment later Lee Seohae did the same again.

Even opening the stainless steel rice-bowl lid, Lee Seohae copied him perfectly.

But she did not copy the eating.

‘Because it’s uncomfortable.’

Lee Seohae knows very well that she is different from others.

Everything, large and small, had always been different.

A genius with an IQ of 160 and her emotions pared away would find it difficult to blend in among ordinary people.

‘So she has no choice but to imitate.’

Seohae must have had her own method.

No matter how innately superior she stood above them, she still wanted to reduce discomfort.

Even in a moment like this, there were countless sudden situations Lee Seohae could imagine.

And among them, the one she most wanted to avoid was this.

“Aigoo, you really don’t know how to eat this! Wait. Sundae soup tastes best if you eat it like this.”

For example, a filthy spoon thrust toward her under the guise of pointless advice.

Something as vulgar as someone not even caring that it had just been in their own mouth before scooping salted shrimp into her bowl.

‘Lee Seohae is still young.’

So naturally, most of the people she had clashed with until now would have been “superiors.”

People she couldn’t openly show anger toward, yell at, or let see her contempt.

Situations where it wasn’t about simply fighting, but being unfairly scolded.

There was a high possibility that Lee Seohae learned to evade it through imitation.

She wouldn’t be having a proper meal anyway, so it didn’t matter how she ate.

Rather, copying the other person’s behavior spared her the useless emotional expenditure, making this side easier.

Even though she had been brought to a place she didn’t want to come to, she blended naturally into the situation by moving without showing discomfort.

“Why aren’t you eating?”

“...I’m waiting for it to cool.”

“You can’t eat hot food?”

“Yes. It burns the inside of my mouth.”

Lee Seohae lied.

Even though when she was alone, she was perfectly capable of drinking freshly poured coffee without issue.

“Hang on.”

Gam Seonghwan took the lid from her rice bowl.

Then, using her chopsticks, he plucked pieces of sundae from the soup one by one and placed them on top of the lid.

Soon the steaming lid was filled.

“Look at this. See how much there is?”

Pointless kindness.

Saying it would cool faster this way and she should hurry and eat, Gam Seonghwan returned to his own meal.

Lee Seohae stared blankly at the separated sundae.

‘So the excuse about not eating hot food failed....’

It was the face of someone already deciding not to make this error next time.

As if she were removing it from the [List of things I can say when I have to eat with others] inside her head.

A very subtle change.

* * *

Watching Shin Seojin and Han Yeoreum’s acting from beyond the monitor, Park Jaeyoung shivered with a catharsis he hadn’t felt in a long time.

‘They’re good.... Both of them.’

Shin Seojin had transformed his exterior so completely it was almost frightening.

But it was Han Yeoreum—who, outwardly, looked hardly any different from Na Yuna, yet seemed like a completely different person—who truly set his heart on fire.

After the meeting with the SBC bureau chief, Park Jaeyoung and Han Yeoreum had held another meeting for the changed directing approach.

“Shadow.... A shadow.”

At Park Jaeyoung’s revised direction, Han Yeoreum seemed to think for a moment.

“First, let’s check the OOTD. Depending on what outfit you’ll wear, Yeoreum, I need to talk to the lighting team.”

“Something a little loose-fit.... Clothes that can cover the neck and wrists. Mostly knitwear?”

Han Yeoreum raised both hands.

“Because there’ll probably be lots of moments where she has to hold things in her hands.... But given her work situation, washing her hands every time wouldn’t really be possible. If she wore gloves, people around her would definitely say something. Starting from ‘why are you wearing that’ to ‘why did you put them on.’ She’d be tired of that kind of situation. So the answer is—like this.”

Han Yeoreum tugged down the end of her sleeve.

The shirt fell to cover about half the back of her hand, protecting her skin like a glove.

“I think she’d have a habit of picking things up using only the tips of her fingers.”

“Ooh. Nice. If she wears oversized clothes, then when we use shadows in the directing, she’ll seem much bulkier than usual. It’ll make her resentment toward society feel stronger too....”

“That’s true. And it’ll also let us properly capture that unique feeling animals have when they puff up their bodies. Her hair would be like this.”

Han Yeoreum half-swept her hair back.

The strands that fell below her collarbone flowed naturally downward.

With one hand gathering a loose half-tie, Han Yeoreum already seemed to have become one with Lee Seohae.

“If you’re going to tie it, why only half?”

“Because that way it protects the neck. As much as possible, it feels like she doesn’t want to expose herself to society....”

“If that’s the case, wouldn’t it make more sense to let it all down? Try fully letting it loose.”

When Han Yeoreum released the hair in her hand, it slipped down in a smooth cascade.

At that moment, she spoke as if she truly were Lee Seohae, someone exhausted by troublesome experiences.

“Because people would say something.”

Lowering her head slightly, she let her hair block both sides of her vision before continuing.

“If she stays like this, Lee Seohae feels comfortable. But I think people would’ve added little comments here and there. ‘Just looking at you is suffocating.’ ‘If you’re going to do that, tie it up.’ Just things people can casually say in passing—but she hated hearing it.”

When Han Yeoreum lifted her head again, the face hidden by her hair was revealed.

“I thought being neat, while still not showing all of herself to the world, would be Lee Seohae’s only personal preference.”

This is an old concern in the field.

When there is one actor, but two characters.

‘If you’re not careful, they overlap far too easily.’

No matter how different the characterizations are, deceiving the public eye is never easy.

Sometimes people even discover the actor’s own habitual cadence that the actor didn’t know they had.

Gestures, attitudes, habits.

From those things, we read familiarity.

It’s the same reason people burst out laughing at comedians’ stereotypical impressions.

A mother nags, a father stays stern until suddenly barking, a younger sibling abruptly bursts into tears.

The image of someone we “know” can be recognized instantly through just a few words and gestures.

People often call it intuition.

Bzzz- bzzz-.

Director Park looked through the monitor at the two people who had become Gam Seonghwan and Lee Seohae.

Unlike Gam Seonghwan’s phone, casually left on the table, Lee Seohae had kept hers tucked inside her jacket.

Even that formed a contrast.

Gam Seonghwan exposes everything.

Lee Seohae hides everything.

“They said to come in.”

After checking her phone notification, Lee Seohae spoke shortly.

It passed by only briefly, but her wallpaper was a photo of the National Police Agency building.

That too had come from Han Yeoreum’s analysis—a photo that looked like she had taken it herself.

Lee Seohae’s own effort to show, somehow, that she belonged in society.

“What? Why all of a sudden?”

Gam Seonghwan still hadn’t seen her wallpaper.

But someday, he would definitely notice it.

And then he would forget every subtle sense of unease he had ever felt.

To set something as your phone wallpaper—the thing you see every single day—means you are sincere about it.

Lovers use each other’s faces.

Families use the faces of newborn children.

Students use words of wisdom they want engraved in their hearts.

So Lee Seohae using a police agency photo as her wallpaper was no different from sending society a message.

I, too, am sincere about something, just like all of you.

And she knows Gam Seonghwan will accept that packaging more ◈ Nоvеlіgһт ◈ (Continue reading) purely and unquestioningly than anyone.

Not just him.

Everyone she had met so far had been the same.

It was an incredibly cost-effective thing.

To gain recognition from a single wallpaper.

‘No one could possibly notice.’

The Lee Seohae Han Yeoreum created was exactly that.

Different from Na Yuna by only the thinnest margin, yet impossible to perceive as the same person.

“W-Wait! Hold on. The bill, the bill—I’ve got it!”

Leaving behind Gam Seonghwan, who was trying to squeeze in one more bite, Lee Seohae walked to the register and slipped her phone back into her pocket.

Gam Seonghwan stuffed meat into his mouth and rushed after her, wallet already out.

‘...Somehow....’

It felt as though they were going to surpass the original work.

That certainty struck Park Jaeyoung hard.

‘If the original was a Gam Seonghwan one-top story, the drama is a buddy story.’

Neither in the original nor in the drama is Lee Seohae’s screen time particularly large.

But interpretation belongs to the viewers.

A perfectly drawn character inevitably steps out of the screen and begins to breathe.

Beside the viewers of 〈Unfair Trade〉, Lee Seohae would absolutely exist.

“...Okay!”

Park Jaeyoung immediately called the cut sign.

The first shoot.

A very nice situation where the okay sign came in a single take.

But Han Yeoreum did not smile.

As if she had truly become Lee Seohae herself.

* * *

“Ahh- I’m so stiff....”

There was a woman scratching at her dry white hair while staring out the window.

Her thick glasses, compressed several times over, kept sliding down the bridge of her nose.

Her name was Seomun Ihwa.

There was no one in this industry who didn’t know her, and when the public thought of a drama writer, she was the first person to come to mind.

“Is it already morning? No.... evening... maybe....”

Seomun Ihwa had one of those unusual names anyone could remember after hearing it once.

But while she possessed an unforgettable name, she was horrifyingly bad at remembering other people’s names.

“What day... is it again....”

If it were only names, that would’ve been fine.

Seomun Ihwa had absolutely no sense of the days of the week either.

She even lacked the ability to gauge time itself.

Looking at the dim sky, she couldn’t tell whether it was dawn or night.

Used to it by now, she casually tossed aside the phone that wouldn’t turn on because she had forgotten to charge it.

Locking herself in her writing room and immersing herself only in her script until she became completely cut off from the world—that was the fate of a writer.

She flipped through the calendar and tilted her head.

“This day.... no... maybe not this day either....”

Eventually giving up on figuring out today’s date by herself, Seomun Ihwa picked up her tablet instead.

Only after pressing the home button and checking the calendar app did she finally learn the date.

“Ahhh. So it’s already gotten this far.”

Come to think of it, she had spent several days writing without properly sleeping or eating.

As the opening work for NetHolics Korea, 〈Seoul Metropolitan City〉 had to contain everything Seomun Ihwa had.

The endless revisions made it feel as though her soul had been scraped raw.

She needed some kind of special stimulus.

“Yaaawn.... Maybe I’ll sleep a little more... then go see a musical or something.”

A new world unfolding before her eyes, overwhelming sounds stimulating her ears.

The best way to gain inspiration was always to see something new.

Just as Seomun Ihwa was about to check what productions were currently running, she paused.

“Come to think of it, I think Jaeyoung said he started filming.”

Seomun Ihwa was a quintessential artist.

Changing her schedule on a whim was everyday life.

“Teacher, there’s also that bleep- going in as On Jihwa in your next project. If you get stuck writing, come watch.”

“Who’s that?”

“Oof.... How can you forget people this badly?”

A month ago, no, was it two months ago.... Or maybe even earlier than that?

Anyway, Seomun Ihwa dragged up the jumbled memory from her head.

“Seoryeong from 〈Strange Tales〉. Huijae from 〈The Great Garland〉!”

Park Jaeyoung had given her a custom answer tailored to the Seomun Ihwa who only remembered people by role names.

“I don’t know, I don’t know. I should go visit. Hopefully it’s an action scene today?”

And so, the giant of the drama world—the greatest top writer no one could surpass—Seomun Ihwa headed for the 〈Unfair Trade〉 filming set.

Seoryeong from 〈Strange Tales〉, Huijae from 〈The Great Garland〉, On Jihwa from 〈Seoul Metropolitan City〉.

But the day she met the bleep- whose name she still couldn’t remember became one of the rare moments Seomun Ihwa actually remembered the date.