Watching her son and daughter-in-law wake up so late, Mrs. Waters was very displeased. She crossed her arms and furrowed her brow, saying, “What time is it now? You’re just getting up? I’ve already heated breakfast in the kitchen several times.”
Nana clung to Carl’s shoulder, feeling a bit scared. She hid behind him and didn’t dare speak.
“Mom, I wasn’t feeling well this morning. I had Nana stay with me in the room,” Carl slowly spoke up as he shielded Nana behind him. “Don’t blame Nana.”
Since it was her own son who said that, Mrs. Waters couldn’t say much more. She could only slightly furrow her brow and say, “Alright then, let’s eat.”
Nana silently sat at the dining table without saying a word.
Meanwhile, Mrs. Waters kept looking at photos of Grace and Carl shooting an MV on the internet. “Son,” she said thoughtfully while staring at them both in the pictures together, “I think you two look really compatible for this MV’s character design.”
Carl held onto Nana’s hand under the table to signal that she shouldn’t overthink things or pay attention to what his mother was saying.
The two people across from him ignored him completely as Mrs. Waters couldn’t find any resonance with them; she left angrily.
Carl spent all day with Nana until dusk before leaving for set.
“We’ll be filming night scenes today so I’ll be coming back late tonight; don’t wait up for me,” Carl kissed Nana deeply on her forehead before leaving.
“Okay,” replied Nana softly as she watched Carl leave.
At the set of their music video shoot later that night, Grace looked at today’s script happily knowing there would be more opportunities to get closer to Carl throughout filming which continued into midnight.
On the way to the set, Carl, still unaware of the situation, sat in the car casually flipping through the script, contemplating how to approach the acting in the evening.
“Carl is here.” As soon as Carl arrived, Grace hurriedly approached him, holding the script, “Carl, this is the coffee I bought for you.”
Carl nodded slightly, still keeping a distance from Grace.
From the evening until late at night, as they continued shooting, Carl began to feel a bit drowsy. However, Grace kept sneaking glances at him, always attentive to his reactions.
Carl was well aware of Grace’s actions, but he chose to pretend not to notice.
As the night grew darker, the crew members gradually dwindled.
“Carl, you worked hard today,” The director spoke first indicating that they had finished shooting everything they needed from Carl tonight.
“Mm,” replied Carl indifferently nodding his head before putting on his suit jacket readying himself to leave soon after finishing work.
He was worried about Nana, wondering if she had fallen asleep.
Grace saw that Carl was about to leave and immediately came up with a plan. She squinted her eyes and pretended to faint just as Carl was saying goodbye. “Carl, I feel dizzy…” Before she could finish her sentence, Grace swayed and fell to the ground.
The crew members were all frightened by this scene. “Grace… Grace… what’s wrong? Wake up!”
Carl couldn’t tell if Grace was faking it or not, but he looked concerned nonetheless. After all, he had grown up with Grace since they were kids and their families were close friends.
For both emotional and logical reasons, Carl couldn’t just let Grace faint there without doing anything.
“Carl…” Weakly waking up from her fake fainting spell, Grace reached out and hugged him tightly. “I want to go home…”
No one at the scene knew where Grace lived so they all turned to look at Carl for help.
“Director, let me take her home.” Slowly speaking out of his long-standing neighborly friendship with her family, he decided to send her back home himself but planned on leaving as soon as he got there without lingering around too much.
Grace felt pleased that her plan had worked out so well as she pretended to be weak while leaning against him in the car on their way back home. She even pulled down part of her shirt pretending that it hurt too much for comfort while repeatedly calling out his name, “Carl…Carl…”
Observing all of this, Carl remained unaffected, driving the car with a cold demeanor.
“Carl… I like you…” Grace suddenly spoke with her eyes closed, attempting to seduce Carl in this moment.
Maintaining a calm expression, Carl pretended not to hear. “We’re arriving soon; I’ll drop you off downstairs.”
Throughout the car ride, Grace continued her attempts to seduce Carl. Worried that Grace might intensify her efforts once they were upstairs, Carl decided to drop her off downstairs.
“Take good rest.” Carl escorted Grace downstairs, not looking back as he left.
Watching Carl’s resolute departure, Grace felt a surge of anger and jealousy.
On the other side, Nana had been waiting at home for a long time and still hadn’t seen Carl return. She began to feel uneasy.
Although Carl had told her to go ahead and sleep without waiting for him, Nana couldn’t bring herself to do so.
It was already so late, why hadn’t Carl come back yet?
Nana felt worried and paced anxiously around the house, repeatedly calling Carl’s phone, only to find it switched off.
“What if something happened?” Nana wondered in her heart, furrowing her brow with concern.
Taking advantage of the fact that Mrs. Waters had not yet noticed Carl’s absence, Nana went alone to the film set and asked the driver to take her there. “Take me to the film set, quickly,” she urged him.
The set was pitch black with no light or shadow in sight. The props used earlier were scattered on the ground, making it even more desolate.
This made Nana even more worried. “Something happened to Carl?” she asked anxiously.
Looking around frantically, Nana wanted to find someone to ask but there was no one on set at all.
Just then, Nana’s phone suddenly rang. She thought it was Carl calling but when she opened her phone, she saw a photo sent by an anonymous person.
In the photo, Carl was helping Grace walk towards her house with a smile on his face.
Nana was shocked at this scene and wondered if this was why Carl hadn’t come back all night – he had been with Grace!
The two people in the photo looked incredibly intimate as if something would happen between them any second now.
Nana’s heart sank little by little as she stared intently at the picture wondering why things turned out like this…
Carl had said he didn’t like Grace so why were they so close?
Had he been lying to her all along?
As Nana continued staring at the picture, suddenly she felt uncomfortable and began experiencing sharp pains in her stomach. She held onto her stomach tightly and cried out in agony, “My…my stomach hurts…my baby!”
“Miss! What’s wrong?” The driver saw that Nana was suffering from pain and asked concernedly.
Holding onto her stomach tightly while looking pale-faced, Nana said, “My stomach hurts so much!”