I was sitting in the company cafeteria when it hit me.
Not the smell of burnt coffee, not the sound of my name being shouted from across the hall.
No.
It was the sight of her.
Jin-ah.
My Jin-ah.
Well, not mine, technically. She never was. But I'd been beside her since high school. She laughed at my dumb jokes, borrowed my notes, cried on my shoulder, and called me at 2 a.m. whenever she needed someone to talk to.
For years, I thought it meant something. That one day, if I just kept being there, she'd look at me and finally realize I was the one.
But today, in that crowded cafeteria, I saw it.
Him.
The new chairman of the company. The kind of man who looked like he was carved out of marble, with a suit that cost more than my monthly rent. He walked past with that cold, domineering aura you only see in K-dramas. And Jin-ah's eyes… they lit up. Just like those female leads.
That's when it hit me like a punch to the gut.
"This can't be real. Drama and reality are not the same…Oh, crap. I'm the second lead."
I nearly dropped my tray. People turned to look, but I didn't care. Years of binge-watching dramas suddenly flashed before my eyes. The patterns, the signs, the cursed role I was playing. Every piece clicked together.
I was the dependable one. The shoulder to cry on. The guy who always showed up with an umbrella when it rained.
Which meant, she wasn't going to choose me.
Not now, not in Episode 16, not ever.
I wanted to laugh. Or cry. Or maybe both. Instead, I sat down with my cold noodles and stared at them like they held the answer to my miserable fate.
If I followed the script like in those K-dramas I watched, I knew exactly how this story ended: me smiling bravely at her wedding while my heart shattered quietly off-screen.
Well… screw that.
I wasn't going to be a second lead in my own life.