“If it’s not rude, may I ask why?”
“…Mm.”
The man hesitated for a moment, but soon looked into Hyunjin’s eyes and answered clearly.
“I have no intention of having relations with someone I don’t love.”
Hearing the answer delivered bluntly, Hyunjin smiled, but in truth he wanted to pound the desk with his fist and laugh while holding his stomach.
What bullshit, acting all high and mighty when you’re just a beast-like alpha who can’t resist omega pheromones. While inwardly ridiculing and mocking the manifestor man to his heart’s content, Hyunjin calmly continued.
“I see. However, I’m not necessarily saying you should have relations. If direct contact makes you uncomfortable, it’s fine to just be exposed to that person’s pheromones without sexual relations. Even then, you slept comfortably without direct contact, didn’t you?”
“…But that time it was a rut.”
His appearance of stubbornly refusing the next meeting with the omega was just like a child. Hyunjin was a bit angry inside, but persuaded the man with a persistent tone.
“Fundamentally, pheromone compatibility is the same whether it’s during a rut cycle or not. Even when it’s not a rut, you’ll probably feel much more comfortable if you’re exposed to that person’s pheromones.”
The man nodded silently. At his tacit affirmation, Hyunjin grinned and recommended once more in a slightly lighter tone than before.
“How about trying to find them once more? Of course, this is only a suggestion.”
“…Understood.”
Eventually the man nodded. Hyunjin wore a satisfied smile and turned his upper body slightly in the chair.
“Then, I’ll continue with the medication without adjusting the dosage. Try it once, and I’ll see you again.”
Even after the man left, patients continued to flood in endlessly. Perhaps because it was Monday, it felt twice as busy as usual. The patients sitting in front of him pulled out their festering, rotting parts to Hyunjin without hesitation, or while hesitating, with depressed faces.
While patiently listening to their words with a smiling face, Hyunjin felt like screaming and running out right away.
Fuck, that’s why I told you to take your medicine on time! Who told you to stop the medicine on your own? If you were going to do that, you should have become the doctor! If you came here on your own two feet because you were suffering, fuck, just take it as you’re told!
The urge to shout like that felt like it would erupt like magma from an active volcano. The cold he had caught over the weekend was still lingering in his body, making the low pressure even worse.
However, there was something more irritating than the cold that had persistently clung to his body and tormented him over the weekend. The fingers of the patient sitting in front of him wriggled on their knee. Seeing that, one afterimage that had been clinging to him like a leech inside his head all weekend, sucking away his reason, came to mind again.
[You seemed to have a fever.]
That bastard’s crooked handwriting, written by moving his fingers in a wriggling motion. The small piece of paper torn haphazardly from a notebook. And those eyes, staring blankly at him while holding out cold medicine or something.
When gasping underneath, he acted like he had no ego, but the moment he held out the medicine, his eyes were clear. So excessively clear that his own reflection was clearly visible in those eyes, nauseating even if just for a moment.
Could those eyes, that expression be given to someone who had just tormented and crushed you?
Hyunjin was truly enraged by the unpleasant rippling in his inner self. It’s already annoying that someone tried to throw a stone into his calm waters, but of all people, it had to be a vulgar omega he despised beyond measure.
So he spat out even more cruel, barbed words and crushed him. After being thoroughly humiliated by him, he had worn an extremely embarrassed expression, albeit very briefly. And then, he returned to that lifeless face like a fucking doll.
That gap was so unpleasant he couldn’t bear it. That the first living expression he showed in front of him was an embarrassed expression from having the trivial cold medicine rejected.
If you’re going to hide your emotions from the start, you should hide them well to the end. The guy who would follow orders with an indifferent face no matter what unreasonable demands were made, to think he could make such an… expression just from having one measly cold medicine rejected, he truly never imagined it.
Insolent. Fuck, so insolent he couldn’t stand it. Who the hell does he think I am? Does a whore like you even know how many people I’ve treated, how famous and competent a doctor I am? Yet you dare, in front of me, you… make that broken tin doll expression? And yet you pity me?
“So… Doctor, I want to stop taking the medicine now…”
Before he knew it, the last patient was sitting in front of Hyunjin. She was stuttering, expressing her desire to stop the medication. No matter how you looked at it, she was a patient for whom it was premature to stop the medicine.
Fuck, if you’re going to do that, just don’t come at all. Why come all the way here and ask to reduce the medicine!
Hyunjin’s fingers moved anxiously on the chart, making tapping sounds. It was Hyunjin’s own secret action created in hopes of a kind of mantra-like effect to control his anger.
Tap, tap, tap. Hyunjin’s fingers, which had been tapping on the chart several times, stopped. The corners of his mouth, which had almost lost their smile, moved gently again to create a smile. He tried to persuade the patient to the end with a caring tone. However, after finishing the consultation with the patient who stubbornly demanded to reduce the medicine as the last one, Hyunjin was exhausted to the point where his body drooped in the chair.
Fuck, it really sucked.
His mood was so bad he couldn’t stand it. He had planned to rest well at home today, but it seemed his mood would only improve if he grabbed that whore’s hair right away and made him kneel before him. It seemed this stuffy feeling would only be relieved if those tear-filled, pitiful eyes were filled with his reflection.
Who the hell are you to hand over such a presumptuous note and irritate me like this? I’ll kill you completely. So that you won’t even think of doing such a thing again. To the point where you’ll piss yourself as soon as you see my face at the door, no, as soon as you hear I’ve made a reservation.
“Doctor, good work tod…”
Hyunjin usually smiled with a gentle face to the nurses and greeted them saying ‘Good work.’ But today he couldn’t afford to do that. Putting on his clothes with rough movements, Hyunjin left the examination room as if kicking it open and headed toward the underground parking lot almost at a run.
*
-This stop is XX Apartment, XX Apartment. The next stop is…
With a hiss, Lee Jeong got off holding the sleeping child.
Lee Jeong sighed. His steps toward Yoonkyung’s house were infinitely heavy. To have to leave a sick child… He felt so sorry to Yoonkyung and even more sorry to Dokyung.
Dokyung’s body, which had been like a ball of fire, fortunately had his fever come down considerably after being given fever-reducing syrup. The problem was that his runny nose meant he couldn’t sleep lying down properly.
In the end, he had passed the cold to the child. He spent a hard time wrestling with the sick child all weekend. Every time the child coughed with his small lips, Lee Jeong inwardly resented the man who had given him the cold. But it couldn’t be helped. It was he himself who had inevitably passed on to the child the filthy cold that the man had left him.
Lee Jeong’s condition had improved considerably, but the problem was Dokyung. Since he thought he couldn’t leave a sick child with Yoonkyung, he wanted to rest just one more day on Monday. However, the manager showed reluctance.
‘Lee Jeong-ssi… I’m sorry, but Monday will be a bit difficult. Please understand our situation too.’
At the manager’s words that it was difficult, Lee Jeong had no choice but to express his intention to come to work. In fact, he knew that the manager of Yeodanhwa was already being very considerate of Lee Jeong’s circumstances.
Who would let someone selling their body rest on weekends? The establishment’s customers mainly flock on weekends. However, Lee Jeong was specially resting on Saturday and Sunday nights because he had a child. He could only leave the child with Yoonkyung on weekday nights.
It had been out of the question at the previous establishment, but this time Yeodanhwa’s manager was being very considerate of Lee Jeong’s circumstances. Lee Jeong, with his outstanding beauty, had quite a few seekers even at the newly transferred Yeodanhwa, and those people were fully willing to come on weekdays if it meant seeing Lee Jeong, making it possible.
So Lee Jeong also had to accommodate the manager’s requests to some extent. In the end, Lee Jeong was on his way to leave the child after apologizing countless times to Yoonkyung. Fortunately, angel-like Yoonkyung readily said it was okay and to bring him as usual.
However, the moment he faced Yoonkyung, Lee Jeong couldn’t help but feel even more sorry.
“Come in, cough cough, Lee Jeong-ssi. Dokyung is sleeping.”
Lee Jeong’s eyes widened. To Lee Jeong, who was asking with his eyes about this situation while looking at Yoonkyung coughing heavily, Yoonkyung answered as if embarrassed. With her face deathly pale and her lips chapped, she looked like a patient no matter who saw her.
“I caught it too. Lee Jeong-ssi must have brought a really nasty cold. The baby caught it and I caught it too… Anyway, come in.”
“……”
“Oh, it’s okay. I said it’s okay. What are you making that face for? Aren’t you going to work? Hurry and give me the baby.”
Looking at Yoonkyung’s face as she deliberately spoke like it was a joke and smiled, Lee Jeong lowered his head. To leave a sick baby with someone who was sick because of me… He truly felt so embarrassed he wanted to disappear into the ground. With hands that truly didn’t want to move, he handed the limp Dokyung over to Yoonkyung. Fortunately, the sleeping Dokyung settled into Yoonkyung’s arms without whining.
“I’ll take good, cough cough, care of him, so don’t worry and go to work.”
“……”
“Hurry up. You’ll be late.”
