Rewind With A Superstar System

Chapter 180: Dirty Janitor

<🎧 Song Recommendation: Smooth Criminal — 2012 Remastered by Michael Jackson>

...

Von knew that if he got caught here, he would face massive consequences. Seeing someone outside was something he hadn’t accounted for in any way.

’Who is she?’ He thought, staring at the girl.

But as he looked at her, Von began to notice a lot of details. More importantly, she looked just as terrified as he did.

’She’s scared too,’ Von realised, his mind racing to put the pieces together. ’And she’s out here in the middle of the night. She’s also breaking the quarantine, so she can’t report me without exposing herself.’

The girl remained frozen for a while, just staring at him like a deer caught in headlights. After a long moment of neither of them moving, Von decided to take the initiative to break the silence.

He stepped forward, sliding his hands casually into the pockets of his dirty blue pants. He made sure to act as natural and confident as possible.

"Hey, what are you doing here?" He asked.

The girl removed her headset and looked at him. "Who are you?"

"I’m the janitor, who are you?"

The girl looked at him with scrutiny from head to toe. As she watched him in detail, Von suddenly remembered he had taken off the fake moustache and his face mask. His heart’s pace increased knowing she might recognize him.

"I haven’t seen many janitors with a pretty face as yours. You’re an actor aren’t you? And you’ve sneaked out of the bubble."

Von blinked. He could instantly tell she had messed up so bad with that assumption. She had just handed him all the cards, and he used that perfect opportunity to retaliate.

He put on a perfectly shocked expression, widening his eyes in fake disbelief.

"What actor? What bubble? Are you an actress?!"

The confidence on the girl’s face vanished in a split second. The color drained from her cheeks.

’He’s not an actor and I just revealed myself to him. I’m in a lot of trouble now.’

Von could practically read her mind as the girl began sweating buckets right in front of him after hearing his words.

She didn’t try to deny it anymore.

"Okay, yes. I’m an actress," she blurted out, her voice dropping into a desperate whisper. "But please, I’m begging you, don’t report me. I’ll get into a lot of trouble if you do."

Before Von could even reply, she quickly reached into the pockets of her oversized hoodie. She pulled out a small stash of cash. It was a thousand dollars. To her, it hurt to lose that amount of money on a whim, but she couldn’t help it in this situation. She had to keep him quiet.

She stretched her hands forward, offering the bills to him.

"Take this. It’s a thousand dollars," she pleaded. "Take it and promise to tell nobody about tonight."

Von looked at the money in her hands for a while. He was even more surprised to find out she was actually an actress. Given the location and timing also, it likely meant that she was among the cast for Perfect Ruins.

But what he was most curious about was why and how did she sneak out of the hotel.

"Hmm," Von thought. "I’ll gladly have your money, and you can rest assured my mouth is sealed. But before then, why are you in the school by this hour if you’re an actress?"

The girl shifted her weight, looking a bit uncomfortable with Von’s sudden question.

"I came here because we’ll be casting in this school in some time," she explained, looking away slightly. "It’s always been my tradition to get familiar with my casting destinations. I’ve been doing this with other places, and this school is my final stop."

"Wow," Von said out loud.

Inwardly, he found it insane that someone like her existed. She was doing the exact same thing he was doing, except she was doing it willingly for her craft, while he was doing it to serve a punishment.

But he was still confused about many things. The girl was taking a very serious risk with her actions. Unlike him, she wasn’t immune to the deadly H-19 virus. If she caught it out here in the city, she might single-handedly end the movie plans with her own hands. He found it a bit too careless, but he couldn’t tell her that.

And it still didn’t make sense to him how she was able to sneak out of a guarded hotel so easily.

"So you were rehearsing when I saw you?" Von asked, getting back to the point.

She bent her head low, looking a bit embarrassed. "Yes."

Von crossed his dirty hands across his clothes and smirked.

"Well, in that case," Von said, "I can help you. You’ll need a partner to rehearse it better, won’t you?"

The girl shot him a scrutinizing gaze, raising a doubtful eyebrow. "Can you act?"

"You can try me."

Von stepped a lot closer to her after saying that. The dim light of the hallway caught his face. For a second, the girl seemed completely lost in his eyes, staring up at him as if she was mesmerized.

But then, reality hit.

She let out a horrified cough and went many steps backwards, waving her hand frantically in front of her nose.

"Ugh, what’s that stench?!" she groaned, holding her stomach as if she was going to throw up. "Is that you? Why do you smell so bad!"

Von winced, suddenly remembering how much he was smelling after his terrible ride in the back of the garbage truck.

He crossed his arms around his chest and leaned on a locker.

"I’ve been doing some dirty work this night, so you can’t blame me," Von defended himself smoothly. "But if you can manage, we could still carry out the plan..."

"Huh?! I’m not managing anything," she snapped, still covering her nose with her hoodie sleeve. She pointed down the dark corridor. "There’s a shower room down there near the gym lockers. Go wash yourself up before you can talk about helping me."

"Hmm," Von caressed his chin in thought. Getting clean sounded like a great idea right now. "Okay, that works. I’ll head to the shower real quick. But before I leave, what’s your name?"

The girl hesitated for a second before answering.

"Chloe."