Chao's POV

I was so shocked at seeing Mean's face on my screen that I was unable to say a word to him. I just quickly ended my video call to Plan.

At the same time I felt so hurt that Plan had allowed him to take his phone and be the one to answer my video call.

I went by myself to a nearby pub and ordered a beer at the counter before looking for a table at a secluded corner.

I looked at each far end of the pub but they were all taken.

Wait, that guy at the corner table... His face looks familiar to me...

I went closer because he was looking down sadly at his drink so I could not see all of his face.

As I approached his table, he looked up.

"Mark!"

"P'Chao???"

"Yeah! You're the one who played the role of Kengkla in the LBC series, right?"

"Yeah..."

"Mark, I've been looking around for an empty table at a corner but I can't find any. Do you mind if I ..."

"Not at all, come join me."

"Hey, thanks so much!"

One of the guys at the counter approached our table with my drink. He asked if I wanted any food to go with my drink so I ordered some calamari and onion rings.

I asked Mark if he wanted to order any food. I told him it was my treat.

"A small order of potato crisps will be fine with me, thanks, P'Chao," he said.

So I ordered that as well and thanked the waiter.

I wondered why Mark was drinking on his own but I did not ask in case it was intrusive of his private life.

"So, why are you drinking alone?" he asked.

The question took me by surprise. I wasn't expecting him to ask.

"I ... I felt that I needed to go out. I didn't feel like staying at my condo unit tonight," I replied. "How about you, where are your friends?"

I felt guilty about asking the question because his face suddenly fell and he looked down at his drink exactly the same way when I first saw him when I entered the pub.

"I just wanted to drink by myself tonight," he said after a brief silence, "I'm trying to forget some incident that really hurt me emotionally."

"You might say we're on the same boat," I finally admitted the reason I was at the pub.

"You wanna talk about it?" he asked.

"You first," I countered.

"Well, I had finally found the courage to confess my feelings to P'Gun but he turned me down," he said, looking like he was about to cry.

"Did Gun say why?" I asked, feeling sorry for him.

"He didn't say exactly why but I had a feeling it's because he likes someone else," Mark replied, bringing the beer bottle to his lips and taking a big gulp from it.

"Oh no! That sucks so bad," I said, patting his shoulder sympathetically.

"My heart is hurting," he said, pounding a fist against the left side of his chest.

"Don't do that," I said, taking his fist away from his chest, "you will hurt yourself physically as well."

"I'd rather hurt physically than emotionally," he said, taking another gulp from his bottle.

The waiter arrived with our order and we alternately ate and drank in silence for a while.

"You still haven't told me your own story," Mark reminded me.

"Just like you, I have been rejected," I said sadly, "the person I love is already taken."

"Would that person be P'Plan?" he asked.

"How did you know?" I asked in shock, not bothering to hide Plan's identity any more.

"I could tell during our last fan meeting that you had something going for him," he replied.

"Was I that obvious?" I asked, feeling embarrassed.

"It's hard to disguise your feelings from an outside observer," he said, "it's funny because sometimes the object of your affections can be so oblivious no matter how much you try to give him some indications."

"That usually happens when the other person is not really interested in you in the first place," I commented my own observation.

"That is so true," he said, and then suddenly before I could say anything else, he broke down in front of me, making me forget my own present sorrows.

"Would you like to spend the rest of the night with me?" I offered.

"I would like to do that, P'Chao, thanks very much," he said, finishing the rest of his drink.