Meanwhile, Huiseo sat alone in the car waiting for Hwan.
“……”
The reason Hwan had left his seat so unnaturally seemed to be to give him time to quietly calm his mind before arriving at the palace. Actually, the excuse Hwan gave was quite ridiculous. What else would he have to retrieve from the classroom?
‘What’s he pretending to need to bring when he doesn’t study at all?’
It was funny, but still, he couldn’t help but be grateful that he’d thought to do that for him.
However, contrary to Hwan’s admirable intention, sitting still alone, Huiseo kept ruminating over that situation. Moreover, the more he did so, the greater regret washed over him.
‘I shouldn’t have just stared in shock then, I should have said this…’
‘No, at that moment this would have been better. Idiot.’
Though he pretended otherwise, words he couldn’t say because he was momentarily flustered kept circling in his head.
He had carelessly sneered at someone else’s family—even if he couldn’t slap him, he should have at least grabbed his collar himself. Would that have relieved this frustration? Even if he couldn’t do that, he should have scraped his insides more ruthlessly. Looking back, he felt like such a fool.
‘…My father is absolutely not someone who deserves to hear such words.’
Someone who has worked and tried so hard for the imperial family their whole life. There’s no reason for him to be demeaned like that.
Tears welled up in Huiseo’s eyes as he rested his elbow on the window frame and uselessly bit his own nails, tick, tick. It felt like he’d truly lose if he let them fall. Even while alone, he was barely holding back with such pointless pride when—
The door suddenly burst open.
Because of that, Huiseo looked back with wide, startled eyes. Of course, no one other than Hwan could open the prince’s car door and enter so recklessly.
In that brief instant, whether Hwan saw Huiseo’s reddened eyes was unknown.
Hwan, who climbed into the car as if throwing his body in, immediately pulled Huiseo into a tight embrace.
When Hwan returned, Huiseo, who had planned to ask playfully even knowing it wasn’t true, “Did you retrieve what you left behind?”, was startled and caught in Hwan’s arms, his lips gaping.
“Did something happen?”
“…No, just.”
“Just?”
“Well. That can happen.”
“…What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Really, who told you to be so pretty that I want to hold you like this?”
Normally, it would have been an embarrassing statement that Huiseo would grimace at and smack his back.
Hwan had actually said it half-prepared to get hit. But for some reason, Huiseo buried his face in his chest without much reaction. Then Hwan immediately pulled Huiseo even tighter.
That embarrassing statement Hwan let out was probably meant to fill up Huiseo’s self-esteem, which must have been completely crushed by Donghyeon. Not ‘just the son of a eunuch,’ but Jeong Huiseo who’s so pretty he can’t help but hold him.
‘…Gives me goosebumps.’
How childish.
He definitely thought that. But because Hwan’s embrace was warm, Huiseo somehow felt like the tears he’d been holding back tightly would burst out again. It would be unseemly. He clicked his tongue softly and squeezed his eyes shut. Then he reached out as if grasping at straws and clutched Hwan’s back.
“It’s okay.”
Hwan whispered that in Huiseo’s ear.
Then, slowly patting him with his large hand, before long he could feel Huiseo’s shoulders, which had been stiffly frozen with tension, gradually lowering. Though that was all, only then could Hwan let out a sigh of relief.
You can’t do it, but I can.
Because he felt he’d somewhat accomplished the ‘comforting Huiseo’ he’d boasted about to Yuwon.
***
‘I’ll make you shed tears of blood on that face soon!’
Actually, the method of revenge Hwan had thought of when he told Donghyeon “wait and see” wasn’t inflicting physical harm like Yuwon. To name it, it would be something like ‘Please Scold Him Operation.’
None other than, just like how he’d bragged about the dodgeball story on a broadcast before, this time too he would subtly slip it in when asked about recent events in a broadcast interview. Of course, this time with a completely dejected face, the opposite of that time.
‘Huiseo cried’ would be about right.
Even without deliberately adding detailed stories, if he smiled vaguely with a sad face and moist eyes, things would flow on their own afterward. People who absolutely couldn’t stand being curious would surely dig into the truth of the incident, starting with “Why?”
‘Then the downside would be that rumors would spread while hushing up what Huiseo heard…’
Still, he thought that if Hong Donghyeon got severely scolded by people as an example, other guys wouldn’t dare think to bring up such words out loud again. Looking at it that way, it was quite an appealing method.
Of course, from Hong Donghyeon’s perspective, it might be such a cruel method that getting beaten would seem better.
However, in conclusion, it was all wrong. Since Choi Yuwon had turned him into pulp first, it became quite difficult to do anything else now. It was bitter that his turn was gone, but Hwan tried to soothe his own heart, saying it couldn’t be helped.
He also had to consider cases where things went according to the method he thought of but the ripple effect was much larger than expected.
After all, it would be broadcast. Nationwide, perhaps even more people than that would learn of those unpleasant words. In the process, it would inevitably reach Huiseo’s father’s ears. If that happened, he couldn’t even gauge how heartbroken Huiseo would be.
‘…So it’s actually a good thing this way.’
Hwan comforted himself and Huiseo like that.
“…Don’t take it to heart. There won’t be such a thing anymore.”
As Hwan patted Huiseo’s back and said so, Huiseo’s head, leaning on his shoulder, nodded silently.
***
But the problem was that starting the very next day, things flowed in a completely unexpected direction.
Donghyeon appeared with a face so messed up it was hard to look at with open eyes. A face that couldn’t be explained away even with the excuse of falling somewhere, that could only be explained as someone having beaten him to a pulp.
Seeing that sight, Hwan also frowned.
Even when Hwan saw him that day, it wasn’t to that degree, so it seemed that after he left, Yuwon, who became even angrier, must have vented his anger on him. In the end, he hadn’t listened to his words to stop because it was causing harm to Huiseo. Ignorant bastard—muttering softly, Hwan clicked his tongue.
‘Someone beat Hong Donghyeon.’
In any case, starting from that fact, rumors spread among the kids like a chain.
“Who on earth?”
“Wasn’t it Choi Yuwon? He called him after it ended yesterday and he went.”
“But does he have a reason to do that? He hates the prince.”
The guys chattering like that made one huge mistake here.
As they knew, it was true that Yuwon hated Hwan. It was a fact no one could deny. However, that didn’t mean he hated Huiseo too. No, the reason he hated Hwan in the first place was because he was too close to Huiseo.
Those who didn’t know the situation too naturally bundled the two together.
‘Choi Yuwon hates Lee Hwan and Jeong Huiseo.’
Actually, thinking that way wasn’t unreasonable either.
Starting from how Huiseo had humiliated him in front of everyone on the first day, he’d been particularly cold to him. Also, recently, the fact that a chilly atmosphere had been created between the two where it was hard to even have a proper conversation after Huiseo coldly rejected his proposal was true.
Amazingly, for such reasons, Yuwon easily escaped from everyone’s list of suspects.
Then the next most likely remaining suspect was none other than Hwan.
Everyone had witnessed what happened in the hallway that day between the two people—no, three people including Huiseo. And they all also knew that Hwan had left Donghyeon with a warning, saying “wait and see” and mentioning tears of blood.
‘Could it be the prince?’
However, it was a story hard to believe easily. Perhaps it was because they subconsciously knew that no matter how immature Hwan was, he wasn’t the type to go that far. So at first, everyone thought “no way” and considered it nonsense. But while murmuring like that, the situation changed rapidly after some guy said this:
“I actually saw the prince going somewhere alone near the parking lot yesterday.”
“Alone? Without Huiseo?”
“That’s what I’m saying.”
“Where did he go?”
“You know, behind that building over there…”
Then a cold certainty settled on the faces of the kids who’d been hesitating for a moment.
“Then isn’t it right that the prince did it?”
“It is.”
The prince beat Hong Donghyeon.
Such speculation had already become an established fact as it passed through the kids’ mouths.
As is always the case with rumors, even nonsensical things got mixed in and snowballed. So much so that there were even guys openly murmuring in front of Hwan. So by that time, neither Hwan nor Huiseo could not know even if they tried.
‘Me? Beat? Hong Donghyeon?’
But I didn’t?
‘That was Choi Yuwon.’
But somehow his name came up, and Hwan had absolutely no idea what this whole situation was about.
