Sx
Threads of Spite
The backstage holding room at the SK Olympic Handball Gymnasium was always a sensory assault before a fan meeting.
The air was dense with the conflicting aromas of hairspray, warm catered kimbap, expensive citrus cologne, and the faint, ozone-heavy hum of three portable clothing steamers hissing in the corner. Upbeat tracks from their discography pumped faintly through the venue’s ceiling speakers, rhythmic vibrations rattling the metal lockers where staff had stashed spare clipboards and lanyards. In less than an hour, four thousand screaming ATINY would fill the tiers of the arena, waving lightsticks in a sea of synchronized red and white, eager to catch every wink, every laugh, and every crumb of affection their beloved idols had to offer.
Hongjoong was tucked in a corner armchair, rapidly revising his speaking notes with a felt-tip pen. Wooyoung and San were in the middle of a wrestling match on the sectional sofa over a bag of honey butter chips, their breathless giggles occasionally rising above the clamor. Jongho was scrolling silently on his phone, humming warm-up scales under his breath, while Seonghwa hovered near the mirror, critiquing the drape of his own tailored vest.
It was an idyllic picture of a world-class boy group at ease.
Then Jeong Yunho pushed through the heavy double doors, and the ambient temperature of the room plunged ten degrees.
He had just come from the primary hair and makeup suite. His dark hair was styled to perfection—parted slightly off-center, textured with soft, tousled waves that gave him the innocent, approachable charm of a university heartthrob. His skin had been buffed to radiant porcelain, a touch of tinted balm highlighting his full lips.
To anyone peering through the frosted glass of the doorway, he was the picture of boyish perfection.
To the styling team standing near the garment racks, he was an incoming artillery shell.
Yunho’s sharp eyes scanned the room with predatory precision, bypassing his members entirely and locking onto the rolling rack reserved for the afternoon’s first set. This wasn't an editorial shoot with Avant-garde leather harnesses; this was an arena fan meeting. The brief was supposed to be high-end casual—laid-back, cozy, effortlessly stylish boyfriend chic.
Three weeks ago, during the preliminary visual concept meeting, the creative team had projected a lookbook across the conference room monitor. Yunho had zeroed in on one particular ensemble the moment the slide flickered to life: an oversized, drop-shoulder charcoal-and-cream distressed mohair cardigan from an exclusive Japanese label, layered over an unhemmed vintage band tee and wide-leg slate trousers. It was slouchy, deeply comfortable, casually expensive, and exactly the kind of unpretentious silhouette Yunho favored.
He had pointed directly at the screen. *“That one. Put my name on it.”*
The head stylist had nodded. Manager Kang had noted it on his tablet. It was settled. For once, Yunho had felt a rare flicker of satisfaction, having secured something he actually liked without needing to bare his teeth to get it.
Now, Yunho stood before his designated section of the rack.
His jaw locked. His nostrils flared.
Hanging beneath the taped label that read *JEONG YUNHO* was a stiff, powder-blue polo knit sweater with an aggressively tailored white collar, paired with ivory pleated chinos that looked like they belonged in a country club catalog. It was bright, boxy, rigid, and entirely devoid of flavor.
He stared at the hanger as if a venomous snake had coiled around it.
"What," Yunho said, his voice quiet, flat, and chillingly distinct, "is this?"
The two junior stylists nearby froze, irons hovering mid-steam.
"Yunho-ah," Seonghwa called out gently from across the room, sensing the immediate shift in the air. "Is something wrong with the fit?"
Yunho didn't answer him. Slowly, deliberate as a ticking clock, he turned his head to survey the rest of the room.
His gaze swept over Hongjoong, over San, over Mingi—and then abruptly stopped dead on Kang Yeosang.
Yeosang was sitting peacefully in front of a secondary vanity near the snack table, nibbling on a slice of dried mango while a makeup assistant applied setting powder to his nose. Draped over Yeosang's slim frame was the oversized, drop-shoulder mohair cardigan. The charcoal and cream wool pooled artfully around his wrists; the faded band tee hung loose against his collarbones; the slate trousers were cuffed just above a pair of chunky designer derbies.
It was the exact outfit.
Every single stitch of it.
Yunho’s hands curled into tight, white-knuckled fists at his sides. The veins along his forearms bulged, a sudden, searing wave of heat rushing up his throat and burning behind his ears.
"You're wearing my clothes," Yunho said.
The room went entirely silent. Wooyoung and San’s bickering died instantly. Hongjoong stopped writing, his pen hovering above the paper. Jongho slowly lowered his phone, exchanging a wary glance with Mingi.
Yeosang blinked, startled out of his quiet daze. He turned in the swivel chair, his wide, doe-like eyes darting from Yunho’s thunderous expression down to the fuzzy knit of his own sweater.
"What?" Yeosang murmured softly, his voice innocent and confused. "Yunho-ah, this was on my rack. The tag said—"
"I don't give a damn what the tag said!" Yunho barked, his voice cracking like a whip through the spacious dressing room.
The makeup assistant working on Yeosang visibly shrank back, dropping her powder brush onto the vanity with a hollow clatter.
Yunho closed the distance between them in three long, menacing strides, towering over Yeosang’s chair. His eyes were wild, dark with an indignation so violent it verged on mania.
"That was my look," Yunho snarled, gesturing viciously at the cardigan. "I claimed that look three weeks ago in the agency conference room. Kang sat right there and wrote it down. The stylists agreed. I specifically told everyone in that room that I was wearing the distressed knit, and now I walk in here and you're sitting there wearing it?"
Yeosang shifted uncomfortably, pulling the sleeves of the cardigan over his hands as if trying to hide beneath the fabric. He looked bewildered, slightly hurt, and entirely unprepared to be the target of such unbridled venom.
"Yunho, hey," Hongjoong interrupted, his tone firm as he swiftly stood up from his armchair and stepped between Yunho and Yeosang. "Lower your voice. Don't yell at Yeosang. He just put on whatever the wardrobe team laid out for him."
"Then the wardrobe team is incompetent!" Yunho fired back, spinning on his heel to glare at the two trembling stylists cowering by the steamers. "Who authorized this? Which one of you looked at the approved mood board and decided to give my outfit away?"
"Yunho, stop it!" Seonghwa commanded, his face hardening as he approached. "Look at how you're acting. The staff works tirelessly for us, and you're screaming like a maniac over a sweater before a show."
"It's not just a sweater, Seonghwa, it's the principle!" Yunho yelled, throwing his hands in the air. "Every single time! Every single comeback, every shoot, every schedule! I tell them what I want, I establish my boundaries, and they completely ignore me! They treat me like an overgrown mannequin they can dress up in whatever leftover garbage nobody else wanted!"
The door to the hallway clicked open.
Manager Kang walked in, a cardboard tray holding four iced coffees balanced in one arm, a walkie-talkie clipped to his belt. He took one step into the room, assessed the defensive postures of the members, the terrified faces of the stylists, and the trembling, furious silhouette of Jeong Yunho, and let out a long, exhausted sigh.
"Yunho," Kang said, setting the coffees down on the nearest table with deliberate slowness. "I could hear you all the way down the hall. What is your problem now?"
Yunho rounded on him like a starved dog.
"My problem?" Yunho hissed, storming up to Kang until they were mere inches apart. "My problem is that you lied to my face. Again."
Kang didn't flinch. He crossed his arms, his gaze flat and utterly unimpressed. "Explain yourself."
"Three weeks ago," Yunho spat, pointing a trembling finger toward Yeosang. "The Japanese mohair cardigan. The slate trousers. I told you that was mine. You wrote it down. You looked me in the eye and agreed. And now I walk into this room, forty-five minutes before doors open, and you've stuck me in some hideous, preppy pastel polo while Yeosang is wearing my clothes!"
Kang didn't even blink. "The visual director changed the palette two days ago."
"Without telling me?!"
"We don't need to consult you for every minor adjustment in the group’s visual balance," Kang replied coolly, his voice infuriatingly steady. "The lighting rig for the arena stage is warm-toned. If both you and Mingi were wearing dark, oversized knits, the center formation would look muddy and heavy. Yeosang needed volume on his upper frame to balance his silhouette, and your height carries the structured knit better. It was a production decision. Deal with it."
"Deal with it?" Yunho’s voice rose an octave, a jagged, incredulous laugh escaping his lips. "Deal with it?! I am sick of hearing you say that! You don't give a shit about visual balance, Kang! You just love pulling the rug out from under me! You love making me wear things I hate just to prove you can control me!"
"Yunho, that's enough," Hongjoong said sharply, grabbing Yunho’s shoulder to pull him back. "You're crossing a line. Back up."
Yunho violently shoved Hongjoong’s hand off his shoulder. "Don't touch me!"
The room gasped. Hongjoong stumbled back half a step, shock flashing across his face before hardening into cold, leader-level fury.
San stood up from the sofa, his casual demeanor vanishing entirely, his body tensing as if ready to physically intervene. Wooyoung’s eyes were wide with disbelief. In their five years as a group, Yunho had thrown tantrums backstage, had berated staff behind closed doors, but he had never physically shaken off Hongjoong in front of everyone.
"Yunho-ah," Yeosang said softly, standing up from his chair. The oversized cardigan slid slightly down his shoulder. His expression was miserable, weighed down by the suffocating tension suffocating the room. "Please. It's fine. I'll take it off. You can have it."
Yeosang reached for the hem of the cardigan, preparing to peel it off his shoulders right there in the middle of the room.
"Don't you dare," Yunho snapped, turning his burning glare on Yeosang.
Yeosang froze, hands still clutching the wool.
"I don't want your fucking charity, Yeosang," Yunho spat, his voice dripping with venom. "I don't want the clothes off your back like I'm some pathetic beggar who needs you to feel sorry for him! Keep the damn sweater. Look pretty in it. That's all you're good at anyway, right?"
The words hung in the air like a lethal poison.
Seonghwa’s jaw dropped. "Jeong Yunho!"
"Yunho, you take that back right now," Mingi said, stepping forward, his voice uncharacteristically deep and menacing.
Yeosang’s face went entirely pale. He stood frozen, his eyes glassy with unshed tears, looking as if he had been struck across the face. He slowly let go of the sweater, lowering his gaze to the linoleum floor, his knuckles trembling.
Manager Kang had finally reached his limit.
He didn't raise his voice, but the sudden, absolute drop in his pitch cut through the chaos like a serrated blade.
"All of you, out," Kang commanded, keeping his eyes locked onto Yunho. "Members, go to the second lounge. Now. Stylists, take your gear down the hall."
"Hyung—" Hongjoong started, his jaw tight.
"Out, Hongjoong. I’ll handle this," Kang ordered.
Hongjoong hesitated, his chest heaving with frustration, before he reached out and took Yeosang gently by the arm. "Come on, Yeo. Let's go."
The members filed out in suffocating silence. As they passed Yunho, San glared at him with undisguised disgust, and Seonghwa shook his head, his eyes heavy with disappointment. Yeosang kept his head bowed, clutching the sleeves of the disputed cardigan, refusing to look up. The stylists scurried out behind them, shutting the heavy door until the only sound left was the dull hum of the fluorescent lights.
Yunho was left alone with his manager.
The younger man was breathing hard, his chest rising and falling beneath his thin undershirt. His hands were still trembling, but the explosive rage that had filled him was beginning to curdle into something sour, dark, and humiliating.
Kang stared at him for a long, agonizing minute. He didn't speak. He simply stood there, watching Yunho crumble under the weight of his own toxic petulance.
"Are you proud of yourself?" Kang finally asked, his voice dead of all emotion.
Yunho gritted his teeth, refusing to meet Kang’s eyes. He looked at the wall, at the mirror, anywhere else. "You provoked me."
"I made an executive styling decision for a four-thousand-seat arena show," Kang said flatly, taking a slow step toward him. "And in response, you threw a temper tantrum like an undisciplined child. You screamed at girls who make barely minimum wage to steam your clothes. You pushed your leader. And then you insulted Yeosang—a boy who has never said a cruel word to you in the entire decade you've known him."
"He was pitying me," Yunho muttered defensively, though the words sounded weak, hollow even to his own ears.
"He was trying to fix a mess *you* created!" Kang’s voice finally rose, sharp and commanding. "Look at you, Yunho. Look at yourself in that mirror! You think you're a victim? You think the world is constantly conspiring to diminish you? You are your own worst enemy. You are so obsessed with having complete, absolute control over every inch of your image that you will burn down your relationships with the only people who actually give a damn about you!"
Yunho flinched, his jaw tightening until it ached.
"You have thirty minutes," Kang continued, pointing a brutal finger toward the powder-blue polo hanging on the rack. "You are going to put on that shirt. You are going to put on those pants. You are going to let the makeup artist fix whatever damage your sweat just did to your face. And then you are going to walk out onto that stage, and you are going to smile until your cheeks split."
"And if I don't?" Yunho whispered, venom still clinging to the edges of his tone, though the fight was rapidly bleeding out of him.
"If you don't," Kang said, leaning in until his breath was hot against Yunho’s ear, "I will pull you from the stage. I will announce a sudden acute illness. And tomorrow morning, you will sit in the CEO's office while we review the security footage of you shoving Hongjoong and terrorizing the styling department. Let's see how much leverage you have then."
Kang pulled back, adjusting the collar of his jacket.
"Get dressed, Yunho. Your public is waiting."
Without another word, Kang walked out, letting the door slam shut behind him.
The heavy thud reverberated through the empty room.
Yunho stood entirely still. The silence pressed against his eardrums, suffocating and cruel. He turned his head slowly, catching his own reflection in the wide vanity mirrors.
His face was flushed red, his meticulously styled hair slightly disheveled, his eyes bloodshot with spite. He looked pathetic. He looked entirely stripped of the effortless, charming grace he prided himself on.
A violent sob of pure, impotent frustration hitched in his throat. He raised his fist, intending to smash it into the glass, to shatter the reflection of the monstrous thing he had become—but he stopped himself millimeters from the surface. He couldn't break his hand. He had choreographies to dance. Formations to hold.
He was trapped in the gilded cage of his own making, and the bars were unyielding.
Trembling, Yunho walked over to the rack.
He unbuttoned the stiff, powder-blue polo knit. The fabric was rough, lacking the luxurious softness of the mohair cardigan that Yeosang was currently wearing in the other room. He pulled it over his head, dragging his arms through the sleeves. He stepped into the ivory chinos, buttoning the waist with fingers that shook with suppressed rage.
The clothes felt like sandpaper against his skin. They felt like a uniform of surrender.
He sat down in the vanity chair and reached for a tissue, roughly blotting the shine from his forehead. He picked up a comb, smoothing the stray strands of his hair back into their perfect, boyish waves.
He took a slow, agonizing breath.
*One. Two. Three.*
He buried the shame. He buried the burning hatred for his manager, the bitter jealousy toward Yeosang, the sickening guilt over what he had said. He locked it all into the dark, reinforced vault beneath his ribs, letting the icy numbness wash over his features.
The door opened twenty minutes later.
"Five minutes to house open, Yunho-ssi," a stage manager called out nervously, lingering half-hidden in the doorway.
Yunho stood up, smoothing down the front of the powder-blue sweater.
When he turned around, the monster was completely gone.
His eyes were bright, sparkling with radiant warmth. A gentle, breathtakingly handsome smile curved his lips, lighting up his features with the irresistible charm of ATEEZ's golden retriever.
"Understood," Yunho said, his voice silky, melodious, and impossibly sweet. "Tell the members I'm on my way."
He walked out into the corridor, his sneakers squeaking softly against the floor. As he approached the tunnel leading to the stage, he saw the other seven members standing in a circle, waiting for the pre-show chant. Yeosang stood between Hongjoong and Seonghwa, keeping his eyes firmly fixed on the ground, the oversized cardigan draping over his shoulders like a shroud.
Yunho stepped into the circle as if nothing had happened. He slung an easy, heavy arm around Wooyoung’s shoulders, his smile never wavering, his posture radiating unbothered warmth.
"Let's give them a great show today, guys," Yunho chirped, his eyes crinkling into joyful crescents as the deafening roar of four thousand screaming fans began to filter through the arena curtains.
Behind his dazzling, saintly smile, his teeth were grinding to dust.