After parting with Yeonjun, Eunha had to sit in a corner seat of the franchise café attached to the school library, immersed in a dazed mood for quite a while. As he idly whiled away the time, what floated through his mind weren’t coherent sentences but fragmented questions.
Why. How come. How did this happen. What am I even doing… Such distant thoughts.
“……”
There had been only one reason he’d been able to continue meeting Yeonjun with composure until now. It was thanks to his conviction that this was a relationship with a clear end. Because they were never going to become anything to each other anyway.
He’d considered it a purely temporary connection, so he could respond without much concern to whatever happened between them. Even when Yeonjun acted brazenly and made his moves, even when he naturally and shamelessly infiltrated his daily life—he’d accepted it all with a “whatever” attitude. It didn’t matter either way. And that was never unfounded complacency.
Severing sexual relationships—there was no act more familiar and easy for Eunha than that. He’d dealt with most of the partners he’d dated until now by cutting them off first in the same way. It wasn’t because he felt nothing for them. What was he, some kind of robot? How could he not develop attachment?
But such feelings had never served as a meaningful obstacle when it came to ending relationships. Not even once had he felt regret. And yet.
“……”
Suddenly he found himself thinking: Maybe he shouldn’t have been in contact so frequently. Maybe it would have been better to put limits on letting him come by every day. He shouldn’t have let him seep this deeply into his daily life……
Each thought was tinged with the color of regret. Since having regret meant the same as developing remorse, Eunha truly found himself feeling remorseful.
What made him so different from other people? Who did he think he was? Why… No matter how much he mulled it over, it was hard to understand.
And what was most incomprehensible was his body acting completely contrary while his mind thought this way.
—Hyung. Are you really waiting for me?
He’d been spacing out, losing track of time, and when he came to his senses at the sound of repeated vibrations and looked, it was 4 PM. Eunha answered the phone with self-mockery, then fell silent as if he’d lost his words at the voice full of anticipation that came through, before he could barely manage to speak.
“…I never said I was waiting for you. I just said I’d hang out with you for a bit since I’m bored.”
—Whatever you say~.
“……”
—I think I can see you for a bit right now, hyung……
The endlessly wavering tone brought anguish even to his somewhat blunt response.
Then at the words that followed, his mind became simple and clear as if a thread had faded.
—I miss you.
It was absurd that three whole hours had passed while he sat still, lost in thoughts about Yeonjun, but objectively speaking, it was only three hours. This was absolutely not a gap long enough to say “I miss you” in such a yearning voice.
And yet such a wavering voice.
What choice did he have?
Eunha let out a sigh with an endlessly troubled heart and stood up. When he arrived at the College of Fine Arts, which took less than five minutes on foot, Yeonjun spotted Eunha from far away and immediately brought a clear, bright expression to his expressionless face.
He strode over and stood before him, unable to readily say anything, then suddenly grabbed Eunha’s arm and began heading somewhere swiftly. Without a single word of explanation, at this abrupt guidance, Eunha had to be dragged along without even finding the timing to resist.
After a short while, the place they arrived at was an empty lecture hall. Eunha, who had inadvertently entered as he was pushed in, turned around at the sound of the door clicking shut.
“Why are we here?”
Instead of answering, Yeonjun approached with his arms slightly spread. Eunha, who easily understood the meaning of the action, furrowed his brow and stepped back.
“…I said no to that.”
“We already hugged once anyway.”
The meaning was that since they’d already crossed that line once, was it really valid now? Eunha hesitated at the plausible logic and recalled the night from a few days ago.
……They had stayed in an embrace, pressed tightly together, for quite a while. Right. They had done that.
But this situation is different. That time, it was unavoidable because you were drunk……
However, the reason he couldn’t quite spit out the sentence that had risen to the tip of his tongue was because Eunha knew himself well. He wasn’t the type to soften up over drunken behavior. Rather, his heart tended to grow cold. He thought drunken whining was a nuisance to others and didn’t particularly like accommodating it either.
But that night… he hadn’t felt that way. He’d just felt sympathetic, a bit sorry, and above all, helpless. He couldn’t do anything in the face of those tears. So he’d held him. Truly unlike himself.
Somehow interpreting that hesitation, Yeonjun stretched his eyebrows coaxingly.
“If you just let me hug you once, I feel like all the hard stuff will fly away……”
It was quite a pitiful tone. A deliberate whine with transparent intentions. As if adapting to Eunha, who didn’t budge at most tricks, Yeonjun was gradually becoming more uninhibited. He didn’t seem to have whined this brazenly from the beginning.
So, intellectually, he knew there was no need to indulge this clinginess. And yet his heart became helpless. Like an obvious, easy audience member who bursts into tears at a melodrama film unified solely with the intention of extracting tears, as if they’d been waiting for it.
Your hardship is my fault. That’s why I told you to attend school properly. When didn’t you listen……
“……”
Instead of bringing out nagging, Eunha dropped his shoulders as if surrendering. At his stance of releasing tension and wariness, Yeonjun’s eyes sparkled and he approached with large strides. He wrapped his fingers around one of Eunha’s wrists and lightly pulled. It was an instant before he was nestled into his embrace as if being placed there. His face was buried in his chest, and two solid arms pressed pleasantly tight around his torso.
Eunha had to quietly stop breathing for a moment. Because that pressure seemed to block even his throat.
Somehow, it felt like a sensation he’d lived forgetting was coming back to life.
“I feel like I can live.”
A low sentiment burrowed into his eardrums. Just as the words suggested, it was a voice that had relaxed as if breathing freely. Feeling a terrible coziness in the warm, snug embrace, Eunha thought vacantly:
Can I really cut this kid off?
“……”
As he mulled it over, his head began to ache. I don’t know. He squeezed his eyes shut.
* * *
After that day, Yeonjun began contacting him again as if he’d never been scarce. Starting with calling on the way home that very night, he also called on the way to school the next day, and while staying at school he regularly relayed his updates via messages, sent various questions, and sometimes took and transmitted photos capturing his real-time moments.
However, unlike before, he couldn’t show himself in front of Eunha first. Due to the nature of his major, he had three major courses where instead of taking exams he had to submit works, and as if paying for his past sins, he had to be stuck at school from early morning until night.
He went to school without exception even on weekends, preparing his works while also studying for exams in required graduation courses and general education courses. Even as Eunha clicked his tongue saying it was all self-inflicted, he felt sympathetic again and went to show his face two more times. Each time, Yeonjun showed a vivid reaction.
Eyes that first lit up with interest upon spotting him even with a complexion completely crumbled from fatigue. A face where his pleased inner feelings were plainly visible without hiding them. Ear tips that turned reddish.
Watching those transparent changes, he felt like what could he do? Since he seemed so happy.
What should I do, was the feeling. When he’s being like this, what can I possibly do……
He was spending such days adrift like a buoy with its string cut. It was one morning, the day before Yeonjun’s end of semester. Park Hyeonji suddenly showed up at the café without any contact. At the appearance of an unexpected face, Eunha’s eyes, as always keeping watch at the counter, widened.
“Park Hyeonji?”
“Hi.”
“What brings you here?”
“Why would I come here? I came to see you.”
“……At this hour?”
At the easygoing reply, Eunha asked dubiously, tilting his head. It was truly a surprising visit. Gu Haebin was a free spirit so it wouldn’t be strange whenever he barged in, but Park Hyeonji was an office worker with intense daily demands.
“I had business at school so I took a day off. While I was at it, I thought I’d see your face and have a meal together.”
A simple explanation came back. Park Hyeonji had graduated from Korea University. The same Western studies department as Yeonjun. The moment he recalled that fact, the eyes he met sharpened deliberately.
“I didn’t contact you on purpose. Because it’s obvious you’d run off somewhere.”
There were bones embedded in the joking tone. Eunha rolled his eyes.
“What would I……”
At the evasive answer, Park Hyeonji gave a snort.
“Anyway, you don’t have plans today, right?”
It meant to give her the day. Eunha hesitated for a moment. The friend who’d suddenly come was a bit troublesome.
But soon he could decide the direction of his answer. It wouldn’t do to send away someone who’d made the trip right to his doorstep. Eunha nodded his head.
