Chapter 195: Door-to-door salesperson.

The stage darkened, then brightened again.

It was her home.

Sophia collapsed onto one end of the sofa. Covering her face with both hands as though exhausted, she spoke a single line to herself.

[Was I...wrong? Why does it feel like my heart is breaking when I think I’ll never see him again...?]

She opened the letter Milton had left behind.

Rustle—

The outer envelope marked “Milton” was torn open, revealing an old, grimy piece of paper inside.

She tilted her head and unfolded it.

Gasp—

Her eyes locked onto the page, and she froze.

The audience stared anxiously at the stage, wondering what had happened when they saw her face drain white.

A beam shone onto the cyclorama, the white backdrop of the stage, revealing the words of the letter.

They were written in a child’s hand, with several misspellings scattered throughout.

[Daddy, Sophia loves you more than anyone in the world!

When Sophia turns thirty, please marry Sophia~

I like Daddy more than dolls or pretty clothes. My wish is to live with Daddy forever!]

It was the first letter she had written to her father when she was five.

His daughter had learned to write unusually early, and when her father saw her first letter, he had smiled with pure happiness.

So tenderly that the young Sophia had been afraid he might melt away before her eyes.

“Sophia. Daddy has...gone to heaven.”

And not long afterward, her father truly disappeared.

Perhaps he really had melted away.

[Dad...dy...?]

Why had she never realized?

In her hazy memories, her father’s face had seemed enormous and impossibly high above her through the eyes of a child.

But it looked so much like Milton’s.

Clear tears filled her wide eyes faster than she could contain them.

Then they spilled down her cheeks.

As she sat there in a daze, voices descended around her one by one and began to layer over each other.

“My Sophia, my beautiful baby. I love you more than anything in the world.”

“Daddy will be our daughter’s umbrella for the rest of his life and protect her from anything bad.”

“I hope you grow up seeing only beautiful things and thinking only happy thoughts...”

“You’re going to marry Daddy? Haha, you should meet a man much better than me.”

“Even if you leave because you like some other man, Daddy will love only Sophia for the rest of his life.”

“Oh, you’re adorable... You’re so adorable it’s bad for my heart.”

“When the weather is nice, let’s pack lunch and go on a picnic with Daddy!”

“Sophia, shall we have a hug?”

That gentle voice she had forgotten.

How could she have forgotten the person who had once been her entire world?

Tears poured from Sophia’s eyes as though something inside her had broken.

The more Milton’s tender voice spoke of his love for his daughter, the more tears welled in the eyes of everyone in the audience and streamed down their faces.

The old-fashioned man who seemed so utterly out of place in the modern age, the man who had given her moments that were inconvenient yet infinitely warm—

was her father, who had come to keep a promise he had made to his daughter twenty-five years ago.

She staggered toward the entrance and embraced the wet umbrella.

A single umbrella left behind by the father who had wanted to become his daughter’s shelter.

[I...look beautiful when I smile.]

Tears still falling, she lifted the corners of her mouth.

It was not the cold smile she had worn at the beginning.

It was a gentle smile that looked remarkably like Milton’s.

The lights slowly dimmed, leaving the mysterious expression on her face behind like an afterimage before fading out completely.

When they came back on—

the audience rose to their feet with wet eyes and gave them a standing ovation that went on and on.

 When Yu Myeong walked into the wings, Derek was there.

He appeared to be standing by for his next performance with Marta.

As Yu Myeong dipped his head slightly and passed, Derek asked coldly,

[Why didn’t you give it everything you had?]

[...What?]

[You could have shone more, but you put your weight behind Natalie instead. Don’t bother denying it. You can’t fool my eyes.]

[That’s not what happened.]

Yu Myeong immediately denied the very thing Derek had told him not to deny.

Derek glared at him as though he might devour him, but Yu Myeong met his gaze without flinching before disappearing toward the dressing room.

Outside, the mid-performance commentary was underway.

[Oh dear, perhaps we should have put tissues beside every seat. Be careful if the cameras catch a close-up of your crying face. It’ll haunt you for the rest of your life. Ah, but...that was moving. As a father raising a daughter myself, I almost cried. She wants to marry some other man instead of her dad? Not over my dead body!]

Hahahaha—

Jerry quickly restored the mood.

[Look at that gentleman over there. His eyes are brimming with tears too. George, what did you think?]

[I’m angry again... Why am I sitting here doing nothing but setting the table for the feast Kyler is going to enjoy?]

[Hahaha. Enough complaining. Give us a proper judge’s evaluation.]

[I liked the contrast between a woman from a time beyond the present and a man from the past. Ordinarily, the generational gap between a father and daughter creates mutual incomprehension. But this play portrayed its “analog” sensibility attractively, so it came across not as outdated, but as something special. That made it beautiful. As always, Yu Myeong’s acting was excellent in the way he walked the line until halfway through, keeping us uncertain whether his love was romantic or familial. But what stayed with me most was Natalie’s performance—how her sharp edges gradually softened and her expression grew brighter.]

Everyone nodded.

Her rigid expression.

Her hesitation before a stranger.

The way her features softened.

The look of anxious anticipation.

And finally, the face of a child as she realized her father’s love and burst into tears.

Natalie had been exceptionally vivid and beautiful on this stage.

[Ah, I loved Natalie’s acting as well. She truly felt like a top actress. Of course, Yu Myeong was excellent too. What did you think, Kyler?]

[...Is that how it looked?]

Kyler left the remark deliberately ambiguous, then turned his attention elsewhere.

[Ah, the person who wrote this script is a Korean writer?]

Before the performances began, Jerry had announced that Eva and Yuk Mi Young had worked as a team to write the pieces for this live broadcast.

Of them, Analog Love had been written primarily by Yuk Mi Young, and it was her script that had caught Kyler’s attention.

[Yes. As Yu Myeong rapidly rose to stardom, the projects he appeared in back in Korea became quite the subject of interest. I heard TW even decided to import one of his Korean dramas. The writer of that very drama wrote this script.]

[I’m curious what kind of person she is. It would have been nice if she were an actress.]

Kyler was known to draw inspiration from people.

For him to say that meant her distinctive sensibility must have left a powerful impression on him.

With that, the mid-performance evaluation ended.

Next came Derek and Marta’s stage.

 This piece was also written by Yuk Mi Young.

As though she had known Derek and Marta all along, she had created a comic romance between an unbearably arrogant rich man and a working-class woman who was too cheerfully oblivious even to recognize his arrogance, answering him in ways that only infuriated him further.

It was an extremely common cliché in Korea.

But this was America.

And, of all people, the actors were Derek and Marta.

Of course, Yuk Mi Young was an avid viewer of Casting Vote, and she must have written the script with some grasp of Derek’s and Marta’s personalities.

But from Yu Myeong’s perspective, as someone who knew what they were truly like, the accuracy with which she had captured them was astonishing.

As expected of Derek McCurdy!

What impressed Yu Myeong was the subtlety of Derek’s acting.

The role was similar enough to his usual personality that he could probably have played it naturally without rehearsal.

Yet he had invented every tiny habit from scratch and recreated the character as someone distinct.

He truly deserved to call himself an actor obsessed with his craft.

[Today is truly incredible! I’ve hosted more than a thousand events and programs of every kind, but the air here tonight feels completely different. It’s so charged I can barely breathe!]

Waaaaah!

[According to what I heard just before coming onstage, text-message votes are currently coming in at more than twice the speed they did during the second live broadcast. And online, everyone is talking about this as though the entire country is watching Casting Vote right now!]

Waaaaaaaah!

[And now, the long-awaited final performance. The stage everyone has been waiting for. Written by Eva Dobransky and performed by Derek McCurdy and Yu Myeong. Please welcome The Door-to-Door Salesman, the final live performance of Casting Vote, with a tremendous round of applause!]

Clap clap clap clap clap—

Even as Jerry spoke, the previous sets were cleared from the side stage, mobile partition walls were raised, and the space was rapidly transformed.

As the camera captured the faces of the audience one by one, all of them brimming with anticipation and enjoying what could only be called perfect happiness, the stage gradually darkened.

Yu Myeong steadied his breathing.

Unlike Analog Love, where each performer took in the other’s energy, nurtured it, and pushed it all the way toward the audience,

The Door-to-Door Salesman was like a violent battle in which each actor tore at the other, trying to overwhelm him with his own energy.

And his opponent was Derek McCurdy.

Lose focus for even a moment, and he’ll eat me alive.

Yu Myeong stepped onto the dark stage, where the audience’s applause still rang faintly in the distance.

The final performance awaited him.

The one that would bring their four-month journey to an end.

 The lights came up.

The set formed by the movable walls resembled an ordinary home.

A living room connected to the front door. A gas stove and refrigerator stood against the rear wall, suggesting an open-plan living room and kitchen. On the opposite side of the entrance was a bedroom, with a bathroom attached farther inside.

It was a compact one-bedroom apartment.

The two actors faced each other on opposite sides of the front door.

Derek stood inside.

He wore a blue tracksuit with one pant leg pulled up over the knee, while the jacket was zipped all the way to his neck.

His hair stuck up in every direction as though it had never touched a comb.

Anyone could see that he was an unemployed layabout.

The unfortunate part was that even this looked good on him.

Outside the door stood Yu Myeong in an oversized suit that did not fit him.

He held a large bag in one hand and a phone in the other, pacing nervously before the door.

Given the title, The Door-to-Door Salesman, and the circumstances, he was presumably a salesman.

Probably a beginner.

And a desperately earnest one.

Sweat trickled down his face from nerves, and he kept wiping it away with his sleeve.

Ding-dong—

Then the door opened, and the entire dynamic reversed.

The unemployed man stepped out.

The salesman scanned him in three seconds.

For an instant, disappointment flashed across his face.

Ah. No chance this guy has money.

[Oh...I think I may have rung the wrong—]

[Ugh, this tracksuit sample is terrible. I’ll have to tell the designer to redo it. It’s my day off, and they still won’t let me rest...]

He was bluffing.

The salesman knew he was bluffing.

And yet, despite the man’s shabby appearance, the boast caught his attention.

Come to think of it, the shoes he had slipped on before coming to the door were...extremely polished.

[Good afternoon, sir! I happen to have a product that would suit a sophisticated gentleman like yourself perfectly. Should you spare me just a little of your precious time, I will do my absolute best to help you make a choice you won’t regret!]

[Hmm...is that so? Come in.]

The salesman bowed repeatedly and stepped into the house.

The unemployed man dropped into a chair, scratched his stomach, then jerked his chin toward another seat.

[Sit there.]

[Thank you, sir! My name is Mark Lowen, an employee of T Corporation.]

[I’m Gillian. So, what are you selling?]

[Our company ran into a funding shortage while developing a new product. Otherwise, you would never be able to purchase it at this price—]

[Listen, I’m a busy man. Skip it and get to the point.]

[Yes, sir. I sell premium toothbrushes!]

At Mark’s impassioned declaration, laughter burst from the audience.

At first, his earnest sales pitch after being fooled by such obvious bragging had seemed pitiable.

But once they realized he was every bit as full of hot air himself, the confrontation between the two men became comical.

[Toothbrushes? How much?]

[This luxury set with silver nanoparticle coating is ten dollars for five. And the Xenotype Alpha, ergonomically designed to clean between your teeth without any need for excessive brushing, is ten dollars for seven.]

Snicker, snicker—

The audience laughed again at the absurd product names and the bargain-bin prices that failed to live up to them.

[They seem a little beneath my status... Don’t you have anything better?]

At that, Mark’s eyes lit up, and he pulled out a box the size of his palm.

[Have you ever heard of an electric toothbrush? This thirty-five-hundred-dollar ultra-precision screw toothbrush developed by our company—]

[No, that’s a little excessive.]

The moment Gillian cut him off, Mark visibly deflated again.

Then it happened.

Gillian did something that felt subtly out of place.

Slide—

With one finger, he nudged the crooked toothbrushes on the table until they were perfectly aligned.

It was an insignificant action.

And yet it felt strangely incongruous with the easygoing unemployed man who wore only one pant leg rolled up and had been scratching his stomach without restraint.

For reasons they could not explain, the audience straightened in their seats.