How much time had passed? Haeseong’s neat lips, as if drawn with a brush, crumbled and soon contained a bitter smile.
With a fishy smile on his face, he took out his phone with his right hand, which had become relatively free with a half-cast, and called Kim Jaeho. Before long, Kim Jaeho answered the phone with a cheerful voice.
[Oh my, what’s the occasion at this hour? Is the date going well?]
“Come to Before Sunset’s third floor right now. Unless you want to see everything go to shit.”
A heavy voice that had just passed puberty swept through the quiet interior. The cold voice filled with chill contained no emotion at all, gloomy enough to give the listener goosebumps.
Haeseong hung up the phone without even listening to Kim Jaeho’s answer and left the bathroom, heading to the room.
When he opened the luxurious hinged door, Lee Euiju and Seo Jiyul were sitting close together. Euiju was busy pushing Jiyul away with an awkward face, and Jiyul, her face flushed red with excitement about something, was pouring questions onto Euiju.
Haeseong felt a sense of déjà vu, as if he had seen this scene before.
‘Right. Back then too, the two of them were just chatting alone in the waiting room.’
Resentment boiled up. He wanted to separate those two himself right away. He wanted to pour every curse that exists in this world onto Seo Jiyul, who was coveting his manager. He wanted to shout that Euiju is mine, that she wasn’t someone the likes of her could dare to covet.
However, Haeseong held back.
-Let’s kill your temper from now on. Even if you’re angry, definitely hold back three times. If you speak nicely, I’ll come running whenever you need me. This isn’t for me, it’s for you, Haeseong, so let’s try together. Okay?
On the day Euiju saved Haeseong, they made a promise. So Haeseong held back.
He held back while listening to the conversations the staff were having, he held back while watching Seo Jiyul sticking right next to Euiju and laughing happily, and he endured his manager’s actions of not being able to push Jiyul away harshly and awkwardly accepting her.
If he got angry here where Jiyul was, Euiju would dislike it. He might not hug him.
Haeseong was truly, so afraid of that.
Thud-.
The phone was thrown roughly onto the table. In an instant, both their gazes gathered on Haeseong.
“Move away a bit.”
“What?”
Jiyul just blinked, not understanding Haeseong’s words. Euiju, who immediately understood Haeseong’s words, nodded and said.
“Right, Jiyul. Let’s go back to your seat.”
It was when Euiju was about to move his chair to the side to separate from her instead. Jiyul, with disappointed eyes, suddenly grabbed Euiju’s hand that was resting on the armrest. In that moment, veins bulged at Haeseong’s temples.
“Why? I don’t mind being like this.”
Phew, a sneer as if in disbelief flowed from Haeseong. His low voice cut through the interior.
“If you’re interested in my manager, sort out your feelings on your own. Don’t fucking stir things up obviously.”
At the overly direct way of speaking, Jiyul’s face colored with bewilderment. Euiju also stood up from his seat in surprise.
“Haeseong.”
“What. Did I say something wrong?”
As the gaze of Euiju looking at him grew increasingly cold, Haeseong turned his head and bit his lower lip.
Haeseong felt wronged. If he knew what kind of talk he had just heard from the staff, Euiju wouldn’t be looking at him with those eyes. The person he most wanted to acknowledge how much he was enduring, how much he was holding back, didn’t acknowledge it and was only blaming him. He felt wronged.
Then, Jiyul’s mouth, who had been sitting with a flushed face just picking at her cuticles, clamped shut. As if making some kind of resolution, she made a determined expression and suddenly stood up from her seat. She intertwined her arm with Euiju’s arm next to her and answered sharply.
“Sunbae-nim, you’re really strange. Liking someone is my heart, and expressing it is also my heart. I like Euiju oppa, and I felt like if not today, there wouldn’t be another chance, so I just expressed my feelings.”
Clearly and precisely. Jiyul, undaunted even by Haeseong’s mean words, expressed her thoughts distinctly. Her confident appearance without being intimidated in front of her senior was cute and bold to anyone who saw. However.
“……”
Why, there are times when a person becomes so flustered that their vision narrows and becomes distant. How could Euiju not know that Haeseong was suppressing his temper and enduring? To show such a sight in front of Jin Haeseong, who was marked by terrible jealousy and possessiveness and affection deficiency, was a disaster.
Actually, from the beginning of the date, he felt the atmosphere flowing strangely, but there was nothing Euiju could do. Since he had led this meeting, he had to take responsibility and wrap up today well, and he had to help the two people get closer somehow.
Euiju never wanted this kind of situation.
“Jiyul. First, let go of this……”
Euiju tried to pull his arm out, but Jiyul bound it even more firmly. A sharp gaze flew to the arm connecting the two.
A crack formed in Haeseong’s cold face.
“You, won’t you let go?”
“Euiju oppa is just sunbae-nim’s manager, not family. I don’t know by what right sunbae-nim is giving such instructions.”
Jiyul’s sharp voice echoed through the room that was neither wide nor narrow.
An emotionless, dry gaze moved slowly. It climbed slowly up Euiju’s body and eventually Euiju and Haeseong’s gazes met.
A chilly silence wrapped around the table once again. A frightening and cold atmosphere, as if sharp needles were threatening from all directions, flowed between them.
For a moment, Euiju saw a bold, strange light flash in Haeseong’s eyes.
“What are you going to do……”
That was when it happened.
Haeseong, with an expressionless face, swept his hair up and grabbed the tablecloth with his uninjured hand. Soon after, he pulled it and flipped it over completely.
Crash-!
“Kyaaa!”
All the glass bowls that came out as appetizers placed on the cloth fell to the hard floor and shattered into pieces. Broken fragments rolled around and greens scattered messily. Surprised, Euiju jumped out and blocked Haeseong’s front.
“Haeseong. What the hell are you doing!”
Haeseong, who had been looking at the fallen dishes without emotion, smirked and said.
“This one really doesn’t have a brain.”
“Jin Haeseong!”
Euiju, who blocked Haeseong’s front, shouted. However, Haeseong seemed to have already lost his reason. With strength so strong that even with his uncomfortable arm he pushed Euiju away forcefully and opened his mouth quietly.
“If you cling to him saying you like him, what do you think will happen to this ahjussi’s reputation? Do you think you’ll be the only one who gets fucked when a sixteen-year-old girl and an adult man get linked for no reason?”
“…What did you say?”
At the subject that came out of nowhere, Jiyul frowned. Actually, since she was busy conveying her feelings, it was a part she hadn’t thought about at all, so her heart sank and Jiyul had no choice but to be shocked.
“Is your goal to ruin him in this industry and chase him out for the reason that you like him? If you two get linked, not only you but ahjussi will get hurt too. If you show all those obvious and not-so-obvious signs like that, can’t you calculate what will happen to this ahjussi in this world where rumors spread fast anyway? Are you such a blockhead?”
“Jin Haeseong!”
“If you really like him, you shouldn’t show it in front of others. Earlier too, what, hold hands? Fucking hell, you’re acting crazy!”
“Th, that’s…!”
At Haeseong’s biting voice, cracks appeared on Jiyul’s confident face. Seeing that, Haeseong turned his head as if in disbelief and looked directly at Euiju.
“Ahjussi. You’re fucking problematic too. What are you doing just sitting there accepting everything she does? What if ahjussi gets fucked because of that? If you get fucked and fired, will you abandon me and just leave?”
“I got it, so calm down. Stop it, Haeseong!”
Haeseong, extremely agitated, glared at Jiyul while breathing heavily.
“I heard the staff spouting dog-like words here, so I called Team Leader Kim. If strange rumors spread because of her and ahjussi gets hurt, I really won’t let it go.”
Haeseong pushed Euiju away with strong force. Then he picked up the car keys that were on the table and roughly opened the door and left.
Euiju, with an awkward face, was about to follow right away but stopped his steps when he realized Jiyul was still there. When he turned around, Jiyul was looking at Euiju with a face on the verge of bursting into tears.
Only heavy and dizzying silence remained in the room. Euiju, who let out a deep sigh, carefully opened his mouth.
“I’m sorry. I’ll apologize on Haeseong’s behalf. Did you come with your manager today by any chance?”
“Yes. She, she’s waiting in the parking lot downstairs……”
“…I should tell her to come up. Can you give me her phone number?”
When Jiyul recited the number in a trembling voice, Euiju swept his hair up and wrote it down. He immediately made the call, roughly explained the situation, and told her to come up right away.
In the room where heavy silence flowed, Jiyul’s sobbing began to flow out. Tears that flowed from her fell and stained her thigh clothing in a circle. After sniffling like that for a while, Jiyul carefully opened her mouth.
“…I’m sorry.”
“……”
“I, I didn’t think that far. I just liked oppa so much that I only thought I had to express it somehow… I’m really sorry.”
Euiju unconsciously reached out his hand to comfort her, who was just shedding tears. However, he stopped abruptly just before touching her.
It seemed like he shouldn’t do this. An awkward sigh burst out from Euiju.
