Jiyeon was scared to go outside. She didn't want to leave her room. Not now, not ever. 

She had read all the hate comments. She'd seen all the death threats. It had been hard to find a single positive comment about her. Some people said she'd been pretty. Some said to give her a chance. 

But most were terrible. 

She's ugly. 

She doesn't deserve Heeseung. 

I hope she dies. 

She's dragging him down. 

She looks like a bitch. 

If I had a face like that I would hide, so why does she seem so confident? 

Jiyeon had always been pretty confident in how she looked. Sometimes, she'd be jealous of someone's eyes, or nose, or perfect hair... but at the end of the day she'd always been confident and happy. 

Now she couldn't look in the mirror without feeling insecure. 

Now she couldn't go outside without wondering whether or not someone would come for her, with bad intentions, and just... kill her. 

She didn't want to think that his fans could be so cruel. But their words scared her. Their words hurt her. 

Still, she logically knew that she couldn't stay inside forever. 

She hoped that no one would recognize her, so it took her forever to figure out what to wear. Finally, she decided on jeans and a plain t-shirt. After a moment's hesitation, she threw a jean jacket on over that. Then, leaving her room, she grabbed a hat and a mask. 

A disappearing hat. It always worked in the kdramas. The character puts on a hat and then poof, they're invisible. 

She hoped that could happen for her too. She'd never wanted to be more invisible than now. 

And she almost was. She made it out of the company building. She made it to the grocery store. She did her shopping without being recognized. 

She almost made it inside. Almost. But she was stepping out of the cab, right in front of the building, when she heard the screaming. 

Jiyeon dropped one of the bags she was holding and stepped back, wanting to go back to the safety of her cab. But the car was gone and the girls were surrounding her, shouting. Shouting all the horrible things they'd already said to her online. 

Her body trembling, she tried to ignore them as she bent down to pick up her groceries, which thankfully hadn't fallen out of the bag. She hopped that maybe they'd mistakenly think they had the wrong person, and they'd go away. 

Her hopes were dashed when one of the girls kicked her. 

She gasped, holding her stomach in pain as she looked up at her attacker. Her attacker, who was raising her foot again. 

"I'm going to crush your ugly face." 

Jiyeon couldn't stop the scream from escaping her as her instinct was to hide her face with her arms and curl up, bracing for an impact. 

It never came. 

"What the hell are you doing?" 

Shaking, she looked up. K was standing in front of her, blocking her from the fans. He she couldn't see his face, but his voice was filled with such rage that it sent chills through her. 

"Let's go," he said, crouching down to look at her. He took her bag in one hand and her hand with the other. "Are you alright?" he whispered, his eyes gentle. 

She swallowed, shaking her head. She felt unable to speak, sure that if she tried she'd just burst into tears. And she was tired of that. She was tired of being weak. 

Holding on tightly to her hand, K led her into the building and away from his furious and confused fans. He didn't let go of her hand until she was, much to her surprise, standing in the middle of his room. 

"You shouldn't go out alone from now on," he told her. "I'll talk to our manager. See if we can get a bodyguard for you too." 

She nodded, blinking rapidly to get rid of her oncoming tears. 

"Jiyeon?" 

She couldn't look at him. 

"Jiyeon? Are you okay?"

"I have to go," she whispered, still not looking at him. "I wanted to make dinner. Thank you..." she said, finally daring to look up at him. "For always rescuing me. One day I'll be able to repay you. I promise," she said, reaching forward and gently taking the bag from his hand. "I'll see you later," she quickly said, turning and rushing out of his room. 

Only when she was alone in the kitchen did she let the tears fall. 

She was scared. But more than the crazy fans... she was scared of the new feelings that were emerging in her heart.