“Did you come out to comfort me for crying earlier? I’m fine, so go sleep. I shouldn’t have brought it up……. I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s okay. Then I’ll go to the baby room and sleep a bit more.”
“Okay. Don’t worry about your siblings, and make sure to go out and play later. With your friends. Got it?”
“Yes, I will.”
After hearing my answer, the teacher yawned softly and disappeared toward the bathroom. I went to the baby room. The baby room was where young children gathered closely together to sleep. I carefully opened the door in case someone woke up, and the five youngest children in the orphanage were each lying face down sleeping in different positions. As if it was the teacher’s spot, I went to the space empty enough for an adult to lie down and slipped in, and the blanket smelled of the warm milk scent unique to babies. Dohyeong and Dahui, who clearly seemed to have collapsed and fallen asleep as soon as they returned to the room, were lying with their feet stretched out this way. I held their cute soles and pressed them firmly for no reason before falling asleep.
Two hours passed and I opened my eyes. The babies must have woken up in the meantime because three were nowhere to be seen, and Dahui and Dohyeong were fidgeting while using my arms as pillows. In the past, when they woke up and I was sleeping, they would wake me up even if it meant turning my eyes inside out, but for some reason today they stayed quietly attached in my arms.
When I bent my arms to hug them both tightly, the two who didn’t know I had woken up were startled and burst into laughter, stomping their feet.
“Hyung-ah.”
“Did you sleep well?”
“Yeah.”
“Did you dream?”
“Yeah.”
“What dream?”
“Um…… doggy ate banana.”
“Dahui, Dahui, princess was pwetty.”
“Dohyeong’s dream was a doggy eating a banana. In Dahui’s dream, a pretty princess appeared.”
“What about hyung-ah?”
“Hyung-ah slept well without dreaming.”
“Hyung-ah, going to play today?”
“What about Dahui and Dohyeong?”
“Um…… I’m sorry. Today I have plans with hyung’s friends. Instead, let’s spend all day together on Saturday. Okay?”
“…….”
They didn’t answer, probably because they didn’t like it. So when I showered them with kisses, they both giggled again.
After eating lunch and getting up in time for the appointment, Dohyeong and Dahui waved their hands saying have a good time. In the end, they were sending me off. They were such cute siblings anyway.
“Ah, it’s Chiwon.”
“Hi!”
“Hi.”
Everyone except me had already gathered, so I hurried and ran over. The movie theater was a place that took quite a while by bus from the orphanage, so I came out early, but I didn’t know everyone would already be here.
“Let’s buy tickets first.”
“There should be seats, right?”
When walking, I usually couldn’t find the way well and wasn’t the type to lead, so this time too I walked looking at the kids’ backs. But after glancing at me falling behind, Eorin came to my side and draped his arm around my shoulder. It was an action he hadn’t done since I confessed after the middle school incident that I was sensitive to touching my neck. As if it came out unconsciously, Eorin immediately raised his arm.
“Ah, sorry.”
“No, it’s okay.”
I felt good when Eorin’s scent came. The closer we got to the movie theater, the sweeter caramel smell became. But when it mixed with Eorin’s scent, it became a smell so pleasant I wanted to take a big breath.
“Are you really okay?”
“Yeah.”
“But, you still…….”
“……Ah, pheromones?”
I still didn’t go around revealing my pheromones well. Because I was so busy closing them right after opening them, I naturally couldn’t really know what it was like to leave them alone. How much should I keep them open to be normal? I carefully opened my pheromones.
“I kept closing them so it became a habit…….”
“……Sorry. I’m not forcing you. It’s okay to keep them closed. There are many people like that too. It’s just that you still…… mm.”
As if it was difficult to choose words, Eorin rolled his eyes. I smiled to show it was okay.
“You smell like a baby. Did you know?”
“Huh?”
“When there’s no wood smell…… even when there is. You have a sweet baby smell.”
“Is it my siblings’ smell? I came after sleeping with them a bit today too.”
As we sniffed each other smelling our clothes, Junsu approached and asked.
“What are you guys doing?”
“Chiwon. He says he smells like a baby.”
“Not wood?”
“Not pheromones, just.”
“Ah, I know. Chiwon smells like a baby.”
Woojin nodded. In Woojin’s arms, purchased at some point, were popcorn and cola.
“Every time I hugged you from behind, I smelled it. It was really nice.”
“Since you came, I only smell caramel.”
“I was hungry, okay.”
“When did you buy it?”
“While you guys were smelling each other.”
Saying it like that made it a bit embarrassing. I turned Woojin around and pushed him.
“I-isn’t it almost showtime? Let’s go in quickly.”
We showed our reservation tickets to the staff standing at the entrance, and we entered the theater. Inside, advertisements were playing. After car and shopping mall ads, cute characters came out to explain things like evacuation routes and viewing etiquette, and soon the lights slowly went out.
Fitting for an action film, from the opening a sleek-looking car appeared and raced down the road. As I listened to the rising exhaust sound and reached for the cola, I only touched an empty holder.
“Cola?”
As I fumbled the holder with my fingers, I heard a small whisper by my ear. When I turned my head, Eorin’s face was right there. In the dark theater, Eorin’s eyes sparkled glossily in the light of the large screen.
“……Yeah.”
As if entranced by Eorin’s face outline glowing faintly, I nodded and Eorin held out the cola. I raised my hand to receive it, but the cup passed my hand and came up near my chin. The straw touched my lips. The ice in the cup swayed making a rattling sound.
“…….”
Feeling like it was difficult to make eye contact, I lowered my eyes and silently put the straw in my mouth. Eorin’s neck area came into my view. The moment I swallowed the cola, Eorin’s Adam’s apple moved.
Even though it didn’t feel like I had drunk several sips, somehow it was hard to breathe through my nose, so I released my lips.
“……Thanks.”
Eorin didn’t answer.
The movie theater was much bigger and more amazing than I remembered. It felt like the movie sound was still ringing in my ears. It was an action comedy, but since it was a foreign film, I didn’t understand well the jokes of the foreign actors appearing here and there. Still, it was very fun.
After watching the movie, we headed to a meat buffet instead of the planned meat restaurant, because if we just went to a meat restaurant, the amount of food would be unmanageable. Not to mention Woojin, and with four seventeen-year-old boys gathering, we had to eat for quite a while to fill our stomachs with meat.
Because of my curfew, we had to part early, and Junsu and Woojin were in the opposite direction from where I took the bus, so they greeted first and disappeared toward the overpass. Eorin said a car was coming to pick him up, but I declined his offer to give me a ride. Eorin didn’t insist once more and stayed by my side so I wouldn’t be bored while waiting for the bus.
Two months had just passed since entering high school. The diary had accumulated as much as two months’ worth of time. About thirty pages, filling the diary only with happy things was itself enjoyable. In middle school, I would write two or three pages and tear them out, write two or three more pages and tear them out, so my diary had clear marks of crumpled torn paper when I turned past the cover. Because of that, I didn’t like opening my diary before. The torn remnants felt like my heart. Unable to empty it cleanly, left tattered. But coming to now, I thought it would have been okay to keep the diary from that time.
It was thanks to my friends. Because they told me that the me from that time was okay to exist inside me. It was a painful memory and still held onto my heels, but it didn’t feel as heavy and sticky as before. If a little more time passed, wouldn’t it change into a shadow lightly attached to my feet? Light enough not to notice even if it’s there, but clearly part of me, the shadow I stepped on and stood up from.
When I reached the movie theater part while writing my diary, I stopped my pen. It was because Eorin’s face came to mind again. Eorin’s pitch-black eyes gave the illusion that time passed slowly when looking at them. Sometimes it was hard to breathe too.
Was it because Eorin was an alpha, so that’s why? It wasn’t that Eorin was scary. I had shaken off all of that on the night I cried holding Eorin’s hand. Still, I was an omega, and Eorin was an alpha…….
The vanilla scent was too sweet…… so maybe that’s why it’s hard to breathe. When sweetness exceeds a certain level, it sometimes blocks the mouth, so that’s why.
The movie theater was fun. I wrote that at the end of my diary. I left thoughts about Eorin hanging on my fingertips. Someday I would write about it, but…… not today.
After having one more class meeting with Teachers’ Day and sports festival agenda items, Yeongjin posted a notice in the Class 5 group chat to pay 20,000 won each. He said 5,000 won would be used for the Teachers’ Day party, and 15,000 won was for the class t-shirt to wear on sports festival day. Class t-shirt……. I sighed at the thought of the class t-shirt. Was that really okay? Just thinking about it made the area around my eyes burn.
On Teachers’ Day, Korean, the homeroom teacher’s subject, was 5th period. It was the perfect time to prepare a party. The kids who ate lunch hurriedly and gathered lined up books on the hallway-side windows so the inside couldn’t be seen, and started decorating the classroom. They hung colorful paper ribbons bought in bulk from the stationery store at regular intervals above the blackboard, and kids who could draw clustered on the blackboard drawing all kinds of pictures with chalk. In the very center, they also wrote in large letters ‘We love Teacher Sunsu.’ Meanwhile, other kids wrote things they wanted to say to the teacher on large rolling paper, and Yeongjin took out the purchased cake and wrapped gift and put them under the teacher’s desk.
“The blackboard looks a bit empty. Someone come and write anything.”
Roh Jinho said. As it turned out, Roh Jinho’s dream was to be a cartoonist, so he was attending art academy too. Looking at the blackboard Jinho was attached to, a picture that looked exactly like the teacher was holding a Korean textbook. When I stared with my mouth open, Jinho noticed me and grabbed my arm and pulled me.
“Uh, uh.”
“Chiwon-ah, come here and write something.”
