A snort escaped at the voice muttering softly. Next came a sense of absurdity.
“Even now.” It was a mystery why he naturally assumed their relationship would continue into the future.
Why am I sitting you down and drawing this conversation out right now…?
Because I want to repent and apologize for my past terrible wrongs?
That was part of it, but more than that.
“……”
Eunha, who had become accustomed to suppressing the lament that kept crawling back up as soon as he swallowed it, opened his mouth.
“Have you ever thought that might be a problem?”
“A problem?”
“That you’re too young.”
Even though he pointed out the crux of the matter directly, there was no particular reaction. Those long eyes just blinked indifferently. A quiet, expressionless face.
He’d expected it, but from any angle, it seemed like Yeonjun felt no sense of anything being wrong. The lament he hadn’t quite swallowed finally slipped faintly through his lips.
At the same time came a fresh realization. He really does think like a kid, doesn’t he.
Of course, that was allowed. Yeonjun was allowed to be that way. Because he was young, as he said. He was an adult in name only—just a few months ago he’d been a student wearing a school uniform. He was still at an age where he didn’t know much yet. No matter how carefree and unconcerned he was about being entangled with Eunha in this current form, that tranquility couldn’t be blamed.
However, Eunha thought that even Yeonjun shouldn’t be that way. He needed to point out what was wrong. He needed to set him straight…
Before doing so, Eunha briefly pondered how to address him. Calling him “ya” like he had with countless others in the past somehow didn’t feel appropriate and didn’t sit well on his tongue.
After stalling for time, Eunha finally opened his mouth with a soft sigh.
“Yeonjun-ah.”
A dry, emotionless call. At that, Yeonjun stiffened momentarily, then eventually looked at Eunha with subtly rippling eyes. Like someone in whom some kind of wave had just stirred.
Ignoring that stark emotion indifferently, Eunha met his eyes directly.
“So you’re saying that until now, you did all that because you liked me.”
“……”
“While I merely dismissed you as some kind of rag.”
The tip of his tongue tasted slightly bitter as he pronounced his own fault.
“Because you liked me. So you came to the cafe every day, looked at me every day, kept approaching me…”
“……”
“You slept with me because of that too?”
“……That’s.”
Yeonjun, who had been blankly blinking at the casual enumeration, suddenly seemed to deflate as if holding his breath. Mmm… He made a sound in his throat as he gently covered the lower part of his face with the back of his hand. The answer came after a fairly long silence.
“……Honestly, I don’t remember well. I was really, really drunk. I have no recollection at all of how I got here.”
“……”
“And then when I came to my senses a bit……”
Yeonjun’s eyes blurred vaguely as he continued speaking. A hazy light gradually formed within them. As if absently chewing over thoughts that surfaced unknowingly.
The meaning was clear. He was recalling last night. Eunha laughed incredulously. Thinking there was no seedling more promising than this.
“……Anyway, it’s also true that it was okay because it was hyung.”
Those words made him feel troubled and self-reproachful again.
And a little angry too. Really.
“What do you mean it was okay?”
“……”
“What am I to you? I’m nobody to you.”
Eunha, supporting his forehead with his palm as if it ached, fell into contemplation. First experience. First time. He thought about the weight of that. Uncharted territory. A problem with no answer key. An unexperienced experience. That’s why they say it’s difficult.
Because it’s difficult, it remains impressively in memory for a long time. So it should be carved in the best form possible for reminiscing—that’s what Eunha sincerely believed. Not to be consumed in this kind of way.
“That’s not true… You’re not nobody.”
Eunha had no idea how he’d somehow become someone who wasn’t nobody to Yeonjun, but for now he accepted the correction as given.
“Fine. Someone you like.”
“……”
“Why?”
“Pardon?”
“Why do you like me? Do you know how old I am?”
What do you even know about me?
The reason he’d interpreted Yeonjun’s interest as sexual curiosity rather than affection was partly because he’d turned his back on that form of emotion for quite some time and his thoughts hadn’t reached that far, but it was also partly because he couldn’t identify the source. He had no clue how Yeonjun had come to like him.
Had there been some special trigger? Had he unknowingly been kind at some point? He tried to trace back but nothing particularly came to mind. It wasn’t that he couldn’t remember—there literally ‘wasn’t’ anything. There truly was nothing between them.
Even the few memories that could serve as triggers were actually things that had only happened recently.
The feelings must have started before that.
He remembered Yeonjun sitting in the same spot every day, quietly letting his gaze linger. When he realized that it had all actually been pure affection, he felt somewhat at a loss and had mixed feelings, but separately, it still didn’t really hit home.
“……Does there have to be a reason?”
“I’m curious. I don’t really understand it either.”
Yeonjun moved his lips as if to say something, then kept them closed for a long time. It looked exactly like he was swallowing back words that were about to slip out unconsciously, so Eunha paid attention.
“I don’t know how to explain it, but just……”
“……”
“……Just, somehow I came to like you. Hyung. I kept thinking about you. So when I went to see you briefly, I felt really… better. I wanted to keep watching you. I didn’t want to go back to school.”
This kid, though… Eunha twisted the corner of his mouth hollowly.
“You need to go to school.”
“It was like that from the first time I saw you. That’s all. Ah.”
“……”
“So then it was love at first sight.”
He was a bit dumbfounded by the monotone way Yeonjun spoke, as if just reciting a fact he’d only now realized. Because he was saying something ticklish so nonchalantly.
“And I do know how old you are.”
“You know?”
“You’re twenty-eight, aren’t you?”
“……Even knowing that, you say things like you like me.”
“Is that not allowed?”
“Of course not.”
“……”
“Of course, it’s not allowed.”
He was asking something that was literally obvious. At the immediate dismissal, Yeonjun pressed his lips tightly shut. His eyes looked as if he hadn’t expected such a firm statement.
In other words, his eyes looked momentarily hurt. An expression where something like disappointment suddenly surged up in an instant.
Eunha averted his gaze. He let out a groan.
No matter how much Yeonjun looked at him like that, wrong was wrong.
“Don’t do that, things like that. Really……”
“……”
“It’s not right. It’s not appropriate. It’s not normal either.”
“……”
“That’s what I want to say, Yeonjun-ah. That’s also why I’m keeping you here like this.”
“……”
“……Don’t do that. From now on. Okay?”
He didn’t bother bringing up things like telling him not to waste time on weird things and to meet proper friends his own age, or that he himself wasn’t a good person—words that were quite clearly for the other person’s sake while putting himself down would only sound like an old fogey.
“It’s not like you don’t know what I’ve been doing and going around. I said it with my own mouth. Sex friends, or whatever.”
He could feel the clinging gaze sink even more, but he simply continued speaking evenly.
“Even knowing that, you shouldn’t like me.”
“……”
“I’m sorry. For only saying things like this. About what happened yesterday and today, and everything that happened before too.”
“……”
“I feel bad for somehow sweeping you up in a strange direction. Like you said, you’re too young.”
Though he was speaking in the gentlest tone possible, in the end all of it was nothing more than the process of severing their relationship. Eunha spoke with precisely that purpose, and Yeonjun wouldn’t fail to read at least that much context.
