In truth, the person Yeongbeom wanted to ask such a question wasn’t Seyeong. He wanted to hear an answer from Seongjo. But since he couldn’t visit him or ask him, he was trying to guess what Seongjo would say from Seyeong’s answer as a substitute.
“Mm, hmm…….”
Seyeong seemed displeased with the question itself, but still carefully considered her answer. It seemed she couldn’t quite refuse Yeongbeom’s question since she’d asked him various things until now. After thinking for a while, she finally gave her answer.
“Wouldn’t it take quite a while? I told you, Yeongbeom-ssi was really my ideal type from the moment we first met. Even if we broke up, I think it would take at least a year…… no, more than two years before I’d even think about meeting someone else or not.”
“……Is that so?”
Yeongbeom smiled faintly. In truth, he wasn’t in the mood to smile at all, but he knew this was a timing when he had to show even a mechanical smile.
“Right?”
At the answer that continued like a soliloquy, Seyeong wrinkled her brow slightly as if finding it strange. She made a puzzled expression and asked Yeongbeom back in a somewhat lukewarm voice.
“What about you, Yeongbeom-ssi?”
He could answer that right away. Skillfully, as if he’d even prepared for it.
“Of course it would take a long time. It would really take quite a while to forget. Much longer than Seyeong…….”
At first it was a mechanical voice like when he usually dealt with Seyeong, but as he continued speaking, Yeongbeom’s feelings changed little by little. It was because he felt as if the person listening to these words wasn’t Seyeong but Seongjo.
Yeongbeom deliberately trailed off wistfully and fell into thought.
Even Seyeong, who hadn’t even been with Yeongbeom for a full year, said such things. That it would take at least one or two years after breaking up before she could meet someone else.
But Seongjo, who had been with him for an incomparably longer time, a whole eight years…… why wasn’t he like that?
When he said he loved him so much, what were all those words?
A bitter smile played around Yeongbeom’s lips.
After that, his daily life didn’t have a single quiet day.
It was mostly bitter, and sometimes he was angry. When he got angry, it bubbled and boiled as if his insides were burning up. It felt like this directionless anger would accumulate and someday explode.
He wanted to know. Seongjo’s current feelings, who exactly this new person he was meeting was, how deep his relationship with that person was. And also whether he might be meeting them to forget Yeongbeom himself…….
To know that, there was someone he needed to meet. Yeongbeom called the person who would answer.
“It’s been a while?”
The one who opened the door and entered was Jinho. They’d hung out together often before breaking up with Seongjo, but when he cut off contact with everyone after the breakup, he’d sorted out Jinho along with them.
He was the heir to a fairly large-scale financial company, and if his elderly father passed away, he would be the next president. The reason Yeongbeom contacted Jinho of all people was because unlike other friends, he thought Jinho would respond to a meeting.
After Yeongbeom broke up with Seongjo in that manner, most of the friends who knew both Yeongbeom and Seongjo turned away from Yeongbeom. It might be partly because Yeongbeom cut off contact first, but even if he hadn’t, the result would have been the same.
Was it because objectively speaking, Yeongbeom was the one in the wrong? It wasn’t for that reason. Even if the person who abandoned the lover he was dating and decided to marry another woman had been Seongjo instead of Yeongbeom, they would have taken Seongjo’s side.
That was power. So he didn’t resent that fact. Even if it had been Yeongbeom, he would have done the same.
But Jinho’s case was a bit different. First, unlike other friends, he was a man without even a minimum of conscience. If it had been other friends, when he called they would have criticized the wrongs Yeongbeom committed and not come out to meet him, but Jinho responded to Yeongbeom’s call like this now. It was probably because interest was far more important than conscience.
Most of all, Jinho didn’t particularly like Seongjo. He’d pretend to be friendly and talk to him in front, but behind his back he didn’t hesitate with vulgar insults. It was a fact even Seongjo himself knew. It was just that Seongjo’s personality didn’t care much about others’ criticism, so he didn’t step up to sort it out.
In a way, it was natural that Yeongbeom had disliked him while dating Seongjo. Jinho was someone who insulted his lover, and it wasn’t just Seongjo he insulted. Every time he saw Yeongbeom, he had a habit of looking him up and down as if appraising his value. He already knew how Jinho talked about him behind his back too. Treatment as a male prostitute receiving sponsorship from Lee Seongjo. It was no exaggeration to say that.
Even now with time passed, the gaze looking at him couldn’t help but be unpleasant. Though today was a day he had to endure.
“Isn’t this when you should be happiest? Why does your face look so terrible?”
Jinho said as soon as he entered the reserved private room. At first hearing it seemed like concern, but there was no way he couldn’t catch the implication hidden in those words. When he stared directly into his eyes, as expected they were full of unpleasant amusement.
Yeongbeom smiled back, curling only the corners of his mouth. And answered.
“I didn’t call you to get your concern, Jinho-ya. You didn’t come out to ask after my wellbeing either, did you?”
“Haha!”
Though it was something that should grate on his nerves, Jinho just burst into laughter without showing any sign of anger. Rather than being offended by Yeongbeom’s sharp words, he seemed to find the changed attitude interesting.
It was certainly a different attitude from the past. When he was by Seongjo’s side, no matter what others said, Yeongbeom would awkwardly smile like a well-behaved doll.
“You’ve gotten interesting while I haven’t seen you, Jo Yeongbeom.”
At first hearing, it sounded like a compliment. Jinho, who had given a generous evaluation, plopped down in the seat across from Yeongbeom.
“Why’d you call me to such a nice place?”
Isn’t it more than you deserve? Swallowing that question, Yeongbeom smiled calmly. Even Yeongbeom wasn’t pleased about choosing a high-end traditional Korean restaurant that was difficult to even reserve for this kind of bastard of all people. But since there was a question only he could answer, he had to pay attention to selecting the location.
The sound of a small knock on the sliding door was heard, and an employee holding a tray entered the room. While teacups were being placed on the table, neither of the two opened their mouths. Yeongbeom, who had been sipping the tea placed before him, only opened his mouth after confirming the employee’s footsteps had grown distant. Without greetings, straight to the main point.
“Seongjo, how’s he been doing lately?”
Jinho wrinkled his face as if a bit surprised. The answer didn’t come right away. He just burst into an even bigger and longer laugh than before. Since he’d already expected an unpleasant reaction, it didn’t particularly bother him.
He deliberately let out an exaggerated laugh, then pretended tears had formed from laughing and unnecessarily wiped at his eyes as he spoke.
“Hey, you’re even less in a position to ask that, aren’t you? I’m not going to say anything about asking after your wellbeing?”
Since it wasn’t words he was hearing from Seongjo himself, there was no impact. Yeongbeom stared at Jinho with his mouth closed as if telling him to just answer. Then he no longer made grating remarks and finally gave an answer along with a chuckling laugh.
“Seongjo’s just doing fine. What, is there an answer you were hoping for?”
It was a slimy question. Jinho himself seemed to have a reaction he expected from Yeongbeom. He could tell what he wanted to say even without hearing it. ‘Do you want to hear that Lee Seongjo is having a hard time because of you?’ That would be it.
Of course there had been times he was curious about that. But right now he wasn’t asking such a question. Yeongbeom ignored Jinho’s words deliberately trying to grate on his nerves further and asked again.
“The person Seongjo’s newly seeing, who is it?”
It was an unwavering tone. Rather, it was Jinho’s face that contorted at those words. He just looked at Yeongbeom as if he didn’t know what he was talking about.
Was he trying to hide it? There was no way someone like Jinho had that much loyalty to Seongjo, so it was right to see it as him not knowing the fact that there was ‘someone.’
Well, unlike other frivolous people around him, Seongjo wasn’t the type to go around revealing his romantic history. It had been that way with Yeongbeom too.
Recalling that fact made him grit his teeth once more. Yeongbeom clenched his fist tightly below the table and swallowed his anger. Meanwhile, Jinho muttered in a puzzled voice.
“There’s someone he’s newly seeing?”
