There was no shortage of muggy heat in the morning, but from late afternoon, rain poured down. He rushed out of the house in a hurry and was late, so he didn’t have an umbrella. Yeon Cheonguk quickly caught a taxi, soaking wet from the rain.
Standing at the hiking trail entrance, he felt chilly. It would be a disaster if he really caught a cold. The heat round singer king competition was right around the corner….
He was staring at his muddy sneakers when someone came running from below the mountain path, splashing through the rainwater. It was Hwang Jegu with a training suit hood pulled over his head. He was even wearing a mask, so he didn’t recognize him at first. Since he was absent today, he must be wearing casual clothes, but he looked particularly menacing with everything black from top to bottom. If they had met one-on-one in an alley, he probably would have backed away.
“Follow me, hurry up!”
Hwang Jegu opened a large umbrella and put his arm around Yeon Cheonguk’s shoulder.
Swoosh. Being dragged along happened in an instant. With his shoulder embraced, his body became a bit warmer. Since he wasn’t going home anyway, it didn’t matter if his shoes and school uniform got muddy. While walking the rainy mountain path, Hwang Jegu seemed to be in a good mood.
“Looks like you scored something somewhere?”
Upon entering the abandoned warehouse, Hwang Jegu abruptly took off his hoodie jacket and threw it at Yeon Cheonguk. He strode ahead and plopped down on the sofa. He tapped the seat next to him and winked cockily.
“Fuck, I scored a hundred-million-won gig. I’ll show you something fun, sit down.”
Outside the window was a downpour of rain, clothes clinging from the rain.
These were elements that brought back memories of last year, so he hesitated, but he was urged to come quickly as Hwang Jegu opened his cell phone, so he followed his words. He draped the jacket Hwang Jegu had thrown off over his school uniform and sat in the seat next to him.
Hwang Jegu opened his phone’s album and pressed the keypad direction key.
“I just changed to this brand new cell phone last month, you know? It has the largest storage capacity in the country, can record continuous video for 1 hour, and even supports stereo sound.”
When Hwang Jegu pressed the volume button, suggestive moans gradually grew louder.
The video he played was a scene of a man and woman having sex, secretly filmed through a ventilation gap. On a sofa in what appeared to be an underground bar, two bodies moved hotly.
The woman’s sultry moaning sounds and the man’s rough breathing drenched in ecstasy were recorded as is.
– Ahh! Ah! Oh my, Representative-nim! Haahng!
– Ms. Jeong, haa. I’m going crazy, because of you. Hm?
Hwang Jegu explained with a fishy smile.
“The ahjussi barely scraping together what virility he has here is the redevelopment committee representative. Jackpot deal, right?”
Even though the image quality wasn’t clear, their hot and intense movements and sense of realism were tremendous. Listening to the conversation, the identities of those who committed adultery were clearly revealed.
He probably filmed it for blackmail. He must have been busy enough to skip school today because of this. As expected, Hwang Jegu’s daily life was in a place much farther than the world Yeon Cheonguk knew.
For a moment, he was mesmerized by the flesh-colored video he was witnessing after such a long time. Hwang Jegu snickered.
“Look at this. Is it fucking entertaining, huh?”
“It is arousing.”
“Don’t tell me you’re hard?”
He only dropped his gaze downward, but a thump sounded in his chest.
Silence flowed over the sofa. Only their breathing and the faint sound of rain moistened the space. For a moment, his breath caught at the fierce brush that spread between their gazes.
It was literal. He couldn’t breathe.
Yeon Cheonguk regretted calling him for no reason today. He shouldn’t have created a situation to be alone together on a summer night like this with a downpour.
No matter how shitty the situation was, he should have dealt with it alone. When he’d already been caught by Manager Kim and his parents, what was he going to do by secretly meeting Hwang Jegu. It was nothing more than weak and stupid behavior.
Did he want to see this bastard even if it meant being weak and stupid?
Why?
No conclusion came. After a few seconds that felt like eternity passed, Yeon Cheonguk thought. His pupils are bigger and blacker than I thought.
Silence can be this heavy and sweet.
What broke the taut and dangerous silence was the sound of Yeon Cheonguk’s sneeze.
“Achoo!”
Because Yeon Cheonguk turned his head and sneezed, the air in the abandoned warehouse completely changed. The sticky humidity disappeared and only coolness remained.
When he sniffled and tried to stand up from his seat, Hwang Jegu stretched out his left leg and blocked Yeon Cheonguk’s stomach.
“Shit…!”
Yeon Cheonguk, who sat back down on the sofa as if shoved, faced Hwang Jegu’s chilly face, which had changed 180 degrees from just before.
“Open your bag.”
“What?”
“You ran away from home, didn’t you?”
“Whaat?”
He was surprised at how he knew and was interrogating him. Because of that, he couldn’t hide his flustered expression, so Hwang Jegu got up himself and snatched the backpack placed next to the sofa.
“I’ve seen runaway bastards once or twice. Making calls you don’t usually make to call me out, hair all disheveled, face haggard with a precarious expression….”
Hwang Jegu, who opened the bag, stopped talking and held the inside of the bag in front of Yeon Cheonguk’s face.
Naturally, the inside of the bag was full of undeniable evidence. It was full of underwear to wear right away, envelopes of money he’d saved up until now, and such.
“You’re wandering around after running away from home and caught a cold.”
Yeon Cheonguk kept his mouth firmly shut. Just before, while Yeon Cheonguk couldn’t breathe in the sticky silence, Hwang Jegu had been observing his detailed appearance. He was so embarrassed that no response came out.
“Why didn’t you call yesterday and called today? Was it yesterday, the day before, when!”
Hwang Jegu growled again, but there was stubborn silence. Hwang Jegu sighed and threw the backpack onto the sofa.
“Where did you sleep?”
Yeon Cheonguk, who was ruminating on what Manager Kim had done, answered in an irritated tone.
“I’m never going back there, to the manager’s house. That’s why I said I needed money. To find temporary lodging.”
“You slept at the manager’s house…?”
Hwang Jegu trailed off with an unbelieving face. Soon, a deep darkness began to settle on his face.
“That bastard was first? Even though you say you meet me for a few bucks, it’s fucking shocking.”
“……”
“The reason you ran away from home.”
He couldn’t say it. He couldn’t say it happened because he was secretly meeting you, nor did he have the confidence to lie.
“The manager knows, right?”
At the cold voice, Yeon Cheonguk turned his head to face forward. Soon Yeon Cheonguk’s eyes widened. Hwang Jegu was twisting his mouth, unable to contain his anger.
“……!”
That was because Yeon Cheonguk was seeing such agitation from Hwang Jegu for the first time. This was a guy who had been calm even when dealing with a gang fight alone in Myeongdong. That guy was losing his composure, swept up in anger.
That sight also caused a great ripple in Yeon Cheonguk.
Seeing Hwang Jegu agitated like never before, an intensely shocking sensation wrapped around his entire body. His face heated up from an unidentifiable passion!
The more he quietly watched Hwang Jegu getting angry, the more his heart felt like it would burst. The unidentifiable passion was too overwhelming. It was a kind of storm he absolutely couldn’t handle.
“……We’re not close enough to be like that. At least I’m definitely not.”
In the end, Yeon Cheonguk denied the storm of emotions that was hard to handle.
“Don’t you know? Hey, how could we be that… like friends… how could that happen.”
“……”
“We can’t be friends. Absolutely not.”
By denying it completely, he calmed his wildly beating heart. Yeon Cheonguk, who was clumsy and clumsy, could only shake off these uncomfortable feelings this way.
The two had been there for each other until they were broken and hurt, but they themselves didn’t know it.
Youth was too hot, so it couldn’t help but be immature.
“You and I live in different worlds and we will. Forever.”
Hwang Jegu’s answer that came back was a blade that sharply cut through all of Yeon Cheonguk’s words.
“Of course. You’re a prostitute who sells his throat for money.”
“……”
