Chapter 17. Missing Fragments of Memory
"Hello everyone, I am the person in the viral video from yesterday. I hope that those who uploaded and are still keeping the video can take it down because it affects my private life very badly. I want everyone to help spread my words to others."
Juwel's clarification video spread quickly. Part of it was because of a face that looked like an angel and part of it was because the cut from the livestream was very entertaining.
Although many people still suspected that this was how Juwel's company handled the media, not everyone believed that Juwel disguised himself as someone else to correct the rumor as what truly happened. They only thought that Juwel's company might have hired someone with a similar face to mislead others. Because there was no evidence, the speculation was quickly dismissed.
[I knew it. I totally knew what she was gonna say. She looks exactly like that person who was smoking yesterday.]
[Yesterday when I watched the video I already felt something was off. Like yeah Juwel has tons of bad rumors, but no one has ever managed to expose any actual bad behavior. People only say he is greedy for wealth and luxury, or that he had some kind of "under-the-table rules" with a big boss, or that he stayed home having kids for an Alpha.]
[Yo then can someone ask her to smoke again or what. She is seriously so damn pretty. I scroll TikTok and every edit of her I see, I save it instantly.]
[Someone already suggested it but she refused.]Outside the window was the noisy sound typical of a city. Car horns, and sometimes the wind blowing from the central air system.
Lights turned on and off without needing fire. Water flowed just by turning a knob. Human voices came out of a flat frame attached to the wall, the thing Corvos called a "TV". At first Juwel secretly called it a blind monster.
If one said that Juwel had gotten used to all of this, it would not be true. But the sense of rejection at the beginning had eased. After all, what bothered him the most was not the strange machines. It was the fact that he had to live under the same roof with the man who once pushed his entire previous life to a bitter end.
After a long day at the company, Juwel stepped into the apartment looking exhausted.
The recent incident had been partly resolved.
They had only been able to resolve the "idol smoking" incident and dispel several conspiracy theories from netizens but had not addressed the root of the problem: the company forcing him to change his public image.
Furthermore, because the incident was unintentional, the public recognition of "idol Juwel" had returned, making the company unable to waste the situation and pushing them to fully exploit his commercial value. They also wanted him to quickly learn how to act like a "cold", "arrogant" person for the long-term role he was about to take.
The hardest part was still pretending not to know how to act as himself while acting as a role he did not understand at all.[1]
Juwel took off his coat, hung it on the rack, then let himself fall onto the sofa, intending to spend the rest of the day reading his favorite book. He glanced at the wall clock.
He was not back yet?
His eyes flashed with a hint of displeasure. Living with someone like Corvos was already annoying, but not knowing where he went or what he was doing made Juwel even more irritated. Even so, he brushed the thought aside and told himself that he should trust that the man would not act recklessly at this moment.
Time passed slowly. His eyes focused on each page of the book but his mind was not fully present.
From time to time, he glanced toward the front door but there was still no sign of Corvos returning.
Juwel had called him, but today he had forgotten his phone at home. It was unclear whether it was on purpose or not, and when he came back they would know.
Only when the clock hands pointed close to ten at night did he finally hear noise from outside the door. Juwel lifted his head slightly, his cold eyes following the door as it slowly opened.
When Corvos stepped inside, Juwel almost froze.
Standing before him was a "lady" with long straight black hair falling to the waist, wearing a tight black turtleneck dress. The sharp-shouldered coat and the knee-high boots matched perfectly, giving him a fashionable look like someone stepping out of a magazine.
At first glance, Corvos looked exactly like a woman, until the light fell sideways across his body.
His shoulder line was wide and angular to a degree impossible for a woman. The tight sleeves revealed firm muscles, and the fabric across his chest, although pressed flat, could not hide the structure of a broad and solid ribcage, completely contradicting the "female" appearance he was trying to present.
A book slipped from Juwel's hands and hit the floor with a dry thud. He had no awareness of when he let go.
Corvos casually placed the handbag on the table, removed the long leather gloves that reached up to his elbows like an elegant lady. He turned his head and glanced at Juwel, his indifferent eyes seeming to say: what is so strange about this?
"Are you insane?" Juwel's voice hissed through his teeth. "What kind of joke is this?"
Corvos turned toward him, completely unbothered by Juwel's reaction.
"I thought you wanted me to cross-dress as a woman like you so you would not feel lonely."
Juwel frowned, his voice unable to hide his irritation.
"I have never said such a thing."
"Ah," Corvos pretended as if he just remembered, "But… am I not beautiful?"
It was definitely a teasing question, and it successfully made Juwel's expression twist.
He bent down to pick up the book, sat back in his seat, and opened to a random page to find something to escape the situation.
When he calmed down, he said:
"You do not look like a girl."
It was unclear whether he was criticizing or desperately trying to defend his mental state.
Too bad Corvos showed a proud smile because he had just played a winning move. He snapped his fingers once, his tone unchanged.
"There is a kind of cross-dressing called cross-dressing in a way that is meant to be obvious."
Corvos knew there was an answer more aligned with what Juwel wanted.
Cross-dressing was not actually that easy to detect. Most ordinary people, even women, had those who were broader and looked sturdier, so appearance alone was not that important in identifying gender.
Corvos knew that. He had never identified gender with his eyes. Sometimes, a fleeting gesture when lifting a cup, the way someone avoided eye contact, or the rhythm of breathing when facing pressure… was enough for him to know whether a person was male or female, or how many years they had lived in the shell of the other gender.
He believed that every person, no matter how they dressed or what they tried to perform, carried a biological habit rooted deep into the bones, not easily imitated. The way they reacted to cold, the way they placed their weight when standing, or the depth of a sigh… Those things, no matter how subtle, could never be erased completely.
To Corvos, gender did not lie in looks or clothing. It lay in the rhythm of life shaped in a certain way, from a time before a person even knew whose eyes would judge them.
…Some people lived their whole life in a body of the correct gender yet always felt misplaced, while others, even when disguised perfectly, could never hide their essence when they were silent. Gender, for him, was not an identification. It was the trajectory that the soul had chosen.
Juwel stayed silent for a moment.
He slowly turned his head to look at him.
This annoying way of talking… Was he still in character or what.
If there were a scale measuring Juwel's anger, it would now be shooting straight to the top and…
The air in the room suddenly seemed to sink, then shattered like a block of glass thrown straight onto a stone floor.
Juwel stayed silent.
It was a strange and dangerous state.
In that brief empty moment after the soft "pạch" sound, he first picked up the book and placed it on the table, then stood up and quietly stepped around the objects in his way. His back was as still as the surface of a lake before a storm.
One step. Two steps.
The sound of bare feet touching the wooden floor was like the ticking of a countdown clock.
Before Corvos could understand what was happening, Juwel's hand reached out, grabbed the very fingers that had so arrogantly snapped in the air, and with a "crack", he bent them "lightly".
The brittle sound froze the entire room for a fraction of a second.
There were many times Corvos felt that Juwel's reactions did not follow common logic. He looked at his fingers being held, and at the same time Juwel's other finger pointed straight at his nose.
"You only need to avoid exposing your identity."
Juwel delivered the short line with a low voice that was sharp like a blade freshly sharpened on stone.
His fingers continued to grip Corvos's hand for a moment longer than necessary, wordlessly telling him that every form of tolerance had its limit.
When Juwel finally released him, his eyes remained fixed on Corvos with clear warning.
Corvos looked completely unaffected by the small "punishment". He rolled his wrist lightly and removed the wig, revealing his real hair falling in soft waves to the nape of his neck.
He paused when he reached the bedroom door, not forgetting to leave behind a look filled with lazy teasing.
"If you do not like this image, next time I will try a different style. It might be one that you prefer."
A faint smirk appeared, the kind that was unmistakably Corvos. It did not look provocative at first glance, yet it was obviously meant to provoke Juwel.
Juwel did not answer.
He only tightened his grip on the book in his hand, as if it was the one thing stopping him from standing up and doing something he should not.
His eyes glinted with deep dissatisfaction. It was not simple anger but a struggle between the feeling of being provoked and the logic that was trying to hold back something even more dangerous than anger.
"…You bastard."
The whispered words fell into the empty space, cold like the last wind of winter, brushing against the other man's back before fading away.
[To the owner of this body,
It's me again, Juwel Rosabrella. Sadly, my situation inside your body is still ongoing.
Today, I met your CEO. Is she a woman with a careful appearance and sharp tongue? If so, we must be talking about the same person.
She did not hesitate to state clearly that you, or rather "I" currently, need to change your demeanor to become colder, sharper, to fit tastes or some strategy I do not yet understand.
I have temporarily delayed this change in case you return and make your own decisions.
However, I will not delay more than a week from now.
I should also mention that during the meeting, I did not hide my discomfort. I may have been rude. I do not deny that the CEO might record this small debt, and so when you return, you may face the troubles I left. I cannot promise to solve everything, but I will try to resolve this issue before you come back.
R.
Signed under the lamp,
On a foggy night.]
On the other side, Corvos finished reporting everything that had happened that day. He sat still on the sofa, looking out the window as if admiring the night scene, but in truth his mind had drifted elsewhere. Corvos grew thoughtful.
Thinking about Juwel's reactions today, he suddenly felt that the seemingly strange behaviors earlier were not strange at all.
It seemed that Juwel did not possess the full memories of his past.
[1] The image the company assigned to the original owner of the body was close to Juwel's own personality, while the original owner's real personality did not match and was difficult for Juwel to perform. So having to act both at once made Juwel feel pressured