Yeohwi slowly pressed down on Dowon and moved. He straddled Dowon’s chest, squeezing his waist with his thighs as he sat. His heavy weight pressed down over the pajamas, restraining Dowon underneath. An obsession could be felt—wanting to hold and confine Dowon even while bleeding, hoping he couldn’t escape.
“Then……”
Yeohwi whispered.
It was a voice like singing, or rather like humming.
“Try asking me.”
His breath brushed past his ear. Suddenly Dowon felt strangely overwhelmed.
“What.”
“The watch……”
Yeohwi held out the watch in his palm to Dowon again. The silver metal watch strap was precariously draped over the bandage stained with red blood.
“Think of me when you look at it.”
“……”
“Never take it off, and don’t lose it either.”
“……”
“Never break it again…… Ask me that.”
Dowon stared up at Yeohwi intently. As he just watched silently without responding, Yeohwi reached out. With his painful fingertips oozing blood.
Yeohwi’s fingers leisurely burrowed between Dowon’s black hair, then swept through very slowly and softly. The black hair flowed smoothly down, covering Yeohwi’s injured hand.
“As if this watch is Dowon-ssi himself. Tell me to cherish and protect it this time.”
“……”
“Say there’s no next time, that you won’t let it go a second time……”
“……”
“Then I’ll accept it.”
Yeohwi continued to whisper while fiddling with Dowon’s hair. His deep eyes darkened as if to suck in Dowon’s soul. Dowon quietly swallowed. The hair on his head stood on end at the rough texture of the bandage touching his scalp and the heat of the palm.
“Say it. To me.”
“……”
“Try asking me.”
A long silence followed after that.
The ticking of the watch’s second hand seemed to be heard, then eventually even that disappeared. A stillness flowed as if they had been thrown into the middle of a complete vacuum universe. Instead, the two’s gazes tangled and their breathing grew ragged.
Yeohwi stared directly at Dowon until the very end. Dowon also didn’t avoid those eyes.
He slowly blinked and opened his lips.
His long eyelashes cast deep shadows under his dark eyes. A calm and heavy voice leaked through his teeth.
“……I’m asking you.”
“More.”
Yeohwi urged.
“That’s not enough.”
Dowon raised his head and lifted his downcast eyelids. A faint heat seeped into his pitch-black eyes that had been without light.
“You protect it.”
Dowon’s hand gripped the back of Yeohwi’s neck. His thumb pressed firmly against the nape where his pulse beat. As if telling him to listen well and calm down.
“As if it were me.”
“……Yes.”
The moment those words fell, the ominously pulled air collapsed in an instant. Dowon slowly pushed Yeohwi away and sat up. Yeohwi smoothly released the hand that had been gripping Dowon’s hair and obediently let him go.
And as if making a vow while giving him space, he affirmed again.
“Yes, Dowon-ssi. I will.”
Dowon took the watch from Yeohwi’s hand. Then he spread the metal watch strap into a round loop and fitted it onto Yeohwi’s wrist.
It wasn’t the ring finger of his left hand, but his left wrist.
The movement was slow and careful.
The cold watch head touched the soft skin on the inside of his wrist where no bandage was wrapped. Dowon’s long fingers pulled back Yeohwi’s sleeve and wrapped the watch strap. While fastening the buckle, a red ribbon flowed down beneath Dowon’s hand. It was the ribbon Yeohwi had tied with his mouth earlier.
For a moment, the tip of the red ribbon brushed over the watch, making it look as if they were connected. It was just an optical illusion, but Yeohwi’s fingers trembled faintly when he saw it.
The buckle was firmly fastened and the loop wrapped around his wrist. Dowon’s watch settled heavily on Yeohwi’s pulse. Above it, the watch’s second hand could be seen moving.
Yeohwi stared blankly down at his own wrist, then slowly raised his arm.
It wasn’t an action anyone told him to do, nor was it to deliberately show it, but it naturally happened that way.
He brought the watch to his lips. Without avoiding Dowon’s eyes, while staring straight into those black eyes as deep and dark as an abyss, he brought his lips to the watch strap.
The lightly gliding touch was cool. Naturally hard. Even though it wasn’t the soft flesh of a human, Yeohwi felt it substituted for Dowon. It felt like it had found its place again, or conversely, like he had lost something.
But now the watch would not leave Yeohwi’s wrist. Like a pledge to stand firm here and protect. Like it could be something similar even if not a ring. It was a symbol of belonging.
“Maybe because it’s what Dowon-ssi wore…… I feel like the watch tastes like Dowon-ssi.”
Yeohwi unconsciously muttered his inner thoughts.
“It’s different from mine……”
Dowon pushed hard against the back of Yeohwi, who was lost in sentiment. Yeohwi made a “euk” sound.
“Shut up and follow me.”
“What? Where?”
“Are you going to leave your finger like that?”
“Ah.”
Yeohwi looked down at his hand in a daze. Though it was hard to see clearly in the darkness, he could feel a wet and hot sensation as blood continued to seep from the ends wrapped in gauze. He hadn’t even realized that bleeding had burst from his fingertips because he had been too fiercely concentrated on the argument.
“I don’t know if you’re tough or if you’re out of your mind.”
Dowon clicked his tongue and turned on the bedroom light. The room instantly brightened and Yeohwi narrowed his handsome eyes.
“Isn’t it probably both?”
“That’s something to be proud of. Sit over there.”
“Yep.”
Dowon pointed to the sofa placed in one corner of the bedroom as if annoyed. Yeohwi got up from the bed as told, shuffling over to sit down. Dowon checked the state of Yeohwi’s fingers in the bright light and turned around.
“Wait.”
He intended to bring medical supplies. This time too, Yeohwi answered dutifully with a “yep.” As Dowon left the bedroom, his footsteps grew distant. Yeohwi sat still and waited for him.
The watch hands on his wrist pointed to 4:23 AM. Even though the bright lighting was on, what caught his eye was the sparkling white gold watch more than the bright red blood. The feeling was still strange. It felt like he had gotten it back, but also like he had lost something. He felt anxious but at the same time felt a sense of fulfillment.
He didn’t really understand his own heart, but he understood Dowon’s thoughts even less.
‘I was almost there.’
The ribbon that had hung long in Dowon’s hand flickered in his mind.
‘What was the thickness…… I really was almost there.’
Yeohwi, who let out a faint sigh, curled up on the velvet sofa. His broad shoulder line drooped slightly downward.
Human desire is like a broken dam—once it starts flowing, it doesn’t know how to stop.
If the watch wrapped around his wrist was a substitute for Dowon, then a ring fitted on his finger would be like eternity with him. That empty space looked particularly cold and desolate.
Yeohwi, who had been silently staring at his own empty finger, let his imagination run wild.
Dowon’s hand.
Long, straight, masculine hands with thick and firm joints…….
‘Are they similar in thickness to my fingers? I think they might have been.’
Well, the watch was the same product too. It fit perfectly without adjusting the strap length, so perhaps the futile hope arose that even the thickness of their joints might be similar.
‘If we wear rings of exactly the same size…… We’d really be like a destined married couple.’
An imagination of sharing wedding rings, holding hands, interlocking fingers.
Just the thought of metal clinking against metal, flesh touching flesh to share body heat made his chest tickle deep inside and his nape grow hot. Yeohwi tightly closed his eyes that had been looking down at the watch.
It was pathetic.
The other person had no such thoughts, yet he alone was drawing an invisible future. Even thinking about it himself, he was beyond help. It was a hopeless one-sided love. But he couldn’t stop.
Like a boiling kettle making a loud noise, the lid rattling as hot steam rises. He couldn’t swallow the heat of the passion rising precariously. It seemed like he could only heat up, heat up, heat up and burst.
Just then, leisurely footsteps broke the silence. The bedroom door opened and Dowon returned.
“Hold out your hand.”
He set down the first-aid kit on the table and sat on the leather stool opposite Yeohwi. As he brought his body close for treatment, their knees crossed and their legs touched. It was a precarious distance where their flesh almost pressed together.
