His heart naturally pounded. His eyes widened in surprise and his pupils trembled as if an earthquake had occurred.
Yoonjo gripped the steering wheel tightly with both hands and pressed hard on the brake. His heart was pounding like crazy, and he felt like he might die from too much blood flow. At that moment,
“Yoonjo-ya, breathe.”
Along with a soft voice, Seonwoo’s hand touched his eyes. It was a temperature that should have felt cool from the air conditioner breeze, but somehow it felt warm. Thump, thump, thump. It felt like his heartbeat was flowing entirely to Seonwoo.
Seonwoo covered Yoonjo’s eyes with his hand and slowly pushed him back. Yoonjo’s body, which had been leaning heavily toward the steering wheel, gradually moved back. With his other hand, he pressed the P button to secure the car. When Yoonjo’s head finally touched the seat, Seonwoo began to pat Yoonjo’s shoulder.
“It’s okay. It can happen. Breathe slowly, and exhale. Yes, good job.”
“Wow….”
“Let’s get out, for now.”
With a click, the seatbelt was released and the car’s engine turned off. Even until then, Yoonjo was staring blankly ahead. When he blinked his eyes slowly, the door opened wide.
Seonwoo, who had come close, tapped Yoonjo’s shoulder and gestured for him to get out. The moment Yoonjo, who had been stupidly looking at Seonwoo, took just one step, his legs gave out and he sat down on the dirt ground. Or rather, he would have if Seonwoo hadn’t caught him as if embracing him.
“Namhang’s best driver can’t get a grip from something like this. Pull yourself together, Ji Yoonjo-ssi.”
“Ah… really, hyung is…. always teasing me….”
“Did your legs give out?”
“Yes, a little….”
“Let’s sit in the driver’s seat for a moment.”
Seonwoo, who helped him sit in the seat again, looked at Yoonjo who was still pressing down on his pounding heart and narrowed his eyes. It was because he noticed earlier that his pronunciation was subtly off when speaking. With a suspicion, Seonwoo bent down and reached out to grab Yoonjo’s chin.
“Huh?”
“Open your mouth.”
When he obediently opened his mouth not knowing what was happening, Seonwoo slightly lowered the tip of Yoonjo’s chin and carefully examined the inside of his mouth. Then he made a tsk sound. Something seemed wrong.
“You bit your tongue a little. You must have been really surprised, baby.”
“I’m not a baby?”
“What do you mean when you were born yesterday? Has the ink on your ID dried? You seem to have gotten your driver’s license last week too.”
He had just turned twenty, but he was an adult. A legal adult. Yoonjo was at an age where he could now take out loans and could answer that he was an adult when someone called home asking if there were any adults. Fire sparked in Yoonjo’s eyes.
“I’m not a baby, I’m an adult! The ink has all dried, okay? Huh? The ink has dried so much it’s about to oxidize, okay? Should I show you?”
When he stamped his feet, Seonwoo moved back with a little distance. He approached again only when Yoonjo’s struggling subsided. He gently touched the edge of Yoonjo’s lips with his thumb, then lowered his hand before long.
“It’s not badly hurt, so be careful from now on. It’ll hurt a bit when you eat kimchi.”
“How can I live without kimchi…. I’m a true Korean, so I need kimchi to swallow rice….”
“Just endure it for a day or two. Are you all calmed down now?”
The heart that had been pounding and beating crazily until just moments ago became quiet as if it had never happened. Only then did Yoonjo realize that Seonwoo had deliberately joked around saying nonsensical things. When he raised his head, his eyes met Seonwoo’s. Instantaneously, a big vibration spread through his chest. When he unconsciously raised his hand and pressed down on his heart, Seonwoo said.
“You must have been really surprised.”
“…Yes. I guess so.”
He himself didn’t know why.
Thump, thump. His heart kept beating.
Yoonjo entered the barn while pressing hard on his chest to calm his heart that kept pounding. Behind him, Seonwoo was following silently. In fact, Seonwoo wasn’t pleased with this environment. Even though it was a barn built outside to be well-ventilated, the smell clinging to the stuffy air unique to summer was unavoidable.
His face was about to naturally scrunch up when at an amazing timing, Yoonjo looked back.
“Hyung, hyung! There, can you see over there?”
Yoonjo was looking at Seonwoo playfully while walking backwards. As soon as he thought he would fall like that, Yoonjo’s body fell backward. Because he had been continuously observing, Seonwoo could naturally reach out and catch Yoonjo’s waist.
“You’re not being careful.”
“Nice shot?”
Yoonjo, whose ear tips had turned red as he spoke like a joke, fluttered away from Seonwoo. Yoonjo pointed to a corner with his fingertip, trying not to look at Seonwoo. One small calf was blinking its big eyes while circling around its mother. There were two more in the pen next to it. A total of three calves were circling around cutely.
Yoonjo seemed to have forgotten he almost cracked his head on the hard barn floor as he began to bounce around more and talk about various things regarding the calves.
“So this calf was born when the mother cow and father cow met. The cow over there is cousins with this cow….”
Of course, most of it was nonsense. Seonwoo showed a puzzled look at the strange words different from usual, but soon nodded and listened. It was because Yoonjo chattering away wasn’t just a day or two thing.
The person himself, Yoonjo, didn’t even know what he was saying though.
“So they say three calves came out this time.”
“It’s like a morning drama…. I guess genealogies can get that tangled.”
When Yoonjo turned his head to the side wondering what he meant, Seonwoo pointed to the mother cows in order with his finger as if organizing.
“So, the mother of these two calves is over there…. That mother cow mated with the cow next to her. Isn’t this a child from a different mother? If this were real, there should be some political fighting.”
Only then could Yoonjo realize how desperately he had spouted nonsense. His face naturally heated up hotly. He, who had been stupidly just opening and closing his mouth, quickly refreshed his gaze by looking at a person walking from the opposite side of the barn.
“Grandpa!”
“Huh? Yoonjo?”
It was a hunched-over grandfather. He smiled brightly at Yoonjo. Yoonjo also bounced over to the grandfather and talked about various things. Seonwoo, who stood behind, had no intention of joining between the two and just quietly watched.
“Wow, do you even take them for walks once in a while?”
“Yeah…. That’s right. But they listen so well and are gentle. Maybe it’s because they’re young.”
So they take cows for walks too…. Well, there was no reason cows would dislike going outside. Seonwoo nodded and listened to their conversation, then shifted his gaze to a calf that had come close to him at some point. The calf was blinking its big eyes and completely capturing Seonwoo in its gaze. Seonwoo unconsciously reached out his hand and slowly stroked the calf’s firm forehead. The short fur felt quite rough.
“Cute, right?”
“Mm.”
Does he know that Yoonjo saying that is cuter? Seonwoo looked at Yoonjo, who was smiling brightly with sparkling eyes, and unconsciously smiled along.
Being by Yoonjo’s side made him keep smiling. The change was so natural that he couldn’t even feel it was strange.
The two people who left the barn followed the path made around the barn following the grandfather’s recommendation and climbed the mountain. For a mountain, it was gentle and not particularly tiring, so they decided to walk. If they had to say, it was to get rid of the barn smell that had seeped between the fabric fibers of their clothes.
Yoonjo was sucking on a soda-flavored Jjujjubar that the grandfather had given him, then glanced at Seonwoo as if gauging. There wasn’t a single village person who didn’t know Yoonjo liked this soda-flavored Jjujjubar. Not knowing when Yoonjo would pop up, each household kept one or two on hand. Naturally, even now, ice cream had naturally rolled into Yoonjo’s hands.
“Hyung, are you really not going to eat it? I’ll give you a bite. I don’t have a cold, and um… I don’t have any weird diseases. My blood type is O.”
“Unfortunately, I’m AB type so I can’t eat it.”
“Aw…. Hyung, you can eat mine. I just can’t eat yours.”
“…Don’t say you can’t eat it when you’ve never even tried?”
At Seonwoo’s words that came back like a reprimand, Yoonjo pursed his lips and then kneaded the cold ice cream and sucked it.
“Aw, what’s that? I shared and ate with my friends and was fine, you know? Isn’t it enough as long as you don’t catch a cold?”
As soon as Yoonjo’s words ended, the conversation broke off abruptly. Yoonjo couldn’t stand the awkward silence that suddenly arrived and immediately opened his mouth.
“Wow, it’s already six o’clock. Time really flies. Being with hyung, time passes incredibly fast. Amazingly….”
Because he had finished all the evening work before coming, Yoonjo was quite relaxed. Usually he would have been restless like a dog that needed to pee, saying he had to get home quickly, but fortunately today was not that day.
As they climbed the mountain path with shuffling steps, a cool breeze blew from somewhere. Whether the sun was setting, the wind strangely carried a chill.
“Tomorrow let’s definitely go to the Space Science Museum, and the day after to the fireworks festival. I’ve actually never been to the Han River fireworks festival. They say it’s really crowded and held on a large scale, right?”
Faced with Yoonjo whose eyes were sparkling with anticipation, Seonwoo felt at a loss for what to say. Since starting his acting career, he had never mixed into such crowds. Moreover, the Han River fireworks festival was a large-scale event where half of Seoul’s population gathered. Naturally, it was a festival Seonwoo couldn’t have gone to.
After briefly contemplating whether to tell the truth, he soon decided to add imagination to imagination. Since he hadn’t not seen it at all, it wouldn’t be a lie. In reality, he could see the Han River from his apartment, and could watch the fireworks festival as if seeing it up close.
“There are lots of people, and the fireworks are splendid. Mm… rather than something done in Seoul, it could be said to be a place where each country shows off their fireworks technology. So years when China participates are especially splendid.”
“Wow…. How was it? Was it really cool? Did you see it in person?”
“It wasn’t a position where I couldn’t see it, so I ended up seeing it every year. Though I’ve never actually gone. Anyway, do you want to go see the fireworks festival? The one at Nokidong Beach?”
At the casual question, Yoonjo paused for a moment. Even if it was an event in the countryside, people were bound to gather. He stood still in place and scanned Seonwoo, who was at least a head taller than him, from head to toe. It was quite a persistent gaze, as if scanning at a nano level.
