If Yiyoung showed even one more moment of weakness, Chahyun felt like he’d be unable to resist and end up clinging to him until tomorrow, so he steeled his heart and turned away. Even without sexual contact, he had no confidence he wouldn’t spend the entire day pestering Yiyoung to play and fool around with him.
The moment he stepped outside and the door closed behind him, Chahyun quietly closed his eyes.
He spread both arms wide and took a deep breath—brilliant spring sunlight poured over his entire body as refreshing air filled his lungs. Chahyun thought triumphantly:
‘I killed it.’ He didn’t know exactly what he killed, but that’s how he felt.
In any case, by Chahyun’s standards, it was his first date in life. Spending the night with the man who’d become his boyfriend that very day seemed like a remarkable achievement even to Chahyun, who was an idiot when it came to dating. Of course, it was purely thanks to Yiyoung still loving the twenty-eight-year-old Moon Chahyun.
Chahyun stretched refreshingly in front of Yiyoung’s front door. Taking steps that couldn’t be lighter, he headed toward the clearing on the hill where he’d parked his car. As he hopped up the steep slope, he passed the following judgment on the twenty-eight-year-old Moon Chahyun, whose character remained a complete mystery:
‘Ruthless bastard.’
Last night, Chahyun had been quite shocked to learn that he hadn’t slept with Yiyoung once during the four months they’d dated. While sex felt terribly obscene to him now, he’d assumed that by that age one would naturally become comfortable with such things. From what he heard, it seemed he’d been the one hesitating even when Yiyoung wanted to.
That’s why he was ruthless. Even Chahyun himself felt like he was going crazy wanting to get closer to Yiyoung, so if it were the twenty-eight-year-old Moon Chahyun who’d been head over heels for him, it would’ve been normal for him to lose his mind at even the slightest touch of their fingertips.
Having reached the car parked in the clearing, Chahyun pulled the key from his pants pocket and thought:
‘Even so, to endure this?’
Crazy bastard. That went beyond being chaste—it was psychopathic.
On the other hand, the current Chahyun, merely an ordinary gentleman, planned to restrain himself moderately. Of course, everything was fun with Yiyoung, but this wasn’t bad either. Since he had absolutely no intention of refusing if the opportunity arose, he should buy condoms first.
Chahyun climbed into his rose gold Rolls-Royce and headed straight home.
Entering the penthouse looking every bit like someone who’d been playing at someone else’s house and spent the night there, he spotted his older brother Moon Juhyuk, who was ten years his senior, for once.
Juhyuk must have just arrived too, as he stood motionless in the living room, slowly looking around the house as if searching for Chahyun. When he saw Chahyun stepping out of the private elevator that connected directly to the penthouse, his already fierce-looking face scrunched up even more.
“Where the fuck were you all night getting your dick wet?”
What a way to talk.
Ignoring Chahyun’s disgusted expression, Juhyuk looked him up and down and added:
“Looking at your face coming in, that’s exactly what you were doing.”
Since it wasn’t wrong, Chahyun dropped his displeased glare and corrected his earlier words with a much more appropriate expression:
“I made love.”
“What bullshit.”
Juhyuk snorted as if sneering, “Do you even know what love is?” Chahyun stiffened his expression sulkily and asked:
“Why are you here?”
“Noona told me to check in on you, so I stopped by.”
Juhyuk was their eldest sister Moon Igyeong’s right-hand man.
With an appearance closer to a bodyguard or mixed martial arts fighter than the second son of a chaebol family, Juhyuk valued hierarchy exactly as he looked. While Juhyuk spoke and acted roughly toward Chahyun in everything, in front of Igyeong he was as loyal as a well-trained Doberman. Juhyuk even obeyed Igyeong’s orders by taking no interest whatsoever in company management and working solely as her chief secretary.
He was certainly a sincere and decent hyung, but should he say there was something strangely spineless about him?
Perhaps that’s why Chahyun didn’t find Juhyuk as impressive as his eldest sister. Of course, just because she had many admirable qualities didn’t mean Chahyun followed Igyeong more.
“Tell noona to stop being so interested in me. Is she a stalker?”
On the other hand, Igyeong loved and was obsessed with Chahyun not as her younger brother but like her own child. Her way of showing love was to always have him tailed, monitoring Chahyun’s every move.
Thanks to that, he’d obtained information that allowed him to live his daily life without trouble even after losing his memories. Though it was annoying that she’d spitefully omitted only things related to Bae Yiyoung.
Juhyuk glared at Chahyun sternly.
“Are you going to be disrespectful? What do you mean stalker about noona?”
“If you’ve confirmed everything you need to report, leave now. I’m going to sleep.”
Chahyun scratched the side of his head irritably and walked toward his room. As he passed Juhyuk, he helpfully informed him:
“And noona has plenty of other people to report to besides hyung.”
The chef and band who’d been at the clearing near Yiyoung’s house the day before, as well as the staff who’d handled the cleanup, must have already reported every detail of Chahyun’s movements to Igyeong.
Suddenly remembering that Igyeong hadn’t approved of Yiyoung, Chahyun’s eyes widened.
‘What if noona calls out the hamster and says something weird?’
If Igyeong met him and threatened him to break up with Chahyun, it would be terribly humiliating. Never mind that it would be like a melodrama—he absolutely refused to be misunderstood as a pathetic man hiding behind his sister’s skirts, even in death.
Until now, Chahyun had been grateful for Igyeong’s love in his own way, so he’d overlooked most interference. But he’d need to meet Igyeong soon and warn her not to do anything embarrassing to him.
As Chahyun headed to his room, he noticed no signs of Juhyuk leaving and quietly turned around. Now he was really getting annoyed. Chahyun gave a short, low, cold command to Juhyuk, who was much taller and bigger than him:
“Leave.”
“……”
Then Juhyuk, who’d had the expression of an older brother keeping Chahyun in line, briefly showed the obedient look he only displayed to Igyeong. At times like this, Chahyun felt that Juhyuk glimpsed Moon Igyeong in him. With his face softening somewhat, Juhyuk nodded and turned away.
In any case, both his eldest sister and his hyung only understood when Chahyun got angry. He wished they’d just moderate themselves before he got angry.
Only after watching Juhyuk leave the penthouse did Chahyun let out a long sigh, pull out his phone from his pocket, and call Director Jin Gicheol. As soon as Director Jin answered, he gave the instruction he’d thought of when leaving Yiyoung’s house:
“Tell Ki Taeseong-ssi I’d like to see him today.”
Naturally, Chahyun had immediately investigated the background of the menacing man he’d met in front of Yiyoung’s house. It wasn’t that he was being petty enough to seek revenge for getting punched. He just wanted to know what kind of person he was since he seemed to be bothering Yiyoung.
Unexpectedly, Ki Taeseong wasn’t particularly bad to Yiyoung and his mother, and they were already practically family. However, since he was someone who went around causing trouble here and there, it seemed worth having a face-to-face conversation at least once.
Before, he couldn’t meddle in Yiyoung’s affairs carelessly, but now he was qualified. After all, he was his boyfriend.
Director Jin answered briefly over the phone:
— Yes.
Chahyun hung up and walked toward his room again.
***
Five days later, at noon. Yiyoung took a photo of the dining table he’d set with lunch.
The rolled omelet had come out particularly pretty, and the color of the kimchi jjigae was a work of art. Suddenly wanting to brag to someone, Yiyoung absentmindedly opened his text message conversation with Chahyun. He uploaded the photo he’d just taken to the message composition field, but hesitated to send it again. For the same reason as before.
‘…Is this too random?’
That was because the last time he’d contacted Chahyun was five days ago.
The evening of the day he’d gone home, Chahyun had asked, “When should we meet?” After they’d set Sunday as their meeting time, there’d been no other reason to contact him.
Naturally, before, he’d exchanged endless trivial chatter with Chahyun through texts.
But now, sending a text for something as minor as letting him know what was for lunch felt awkward. He could clearly picture Chahyun making a puzzled face, thinking “So what do you want me to do about it?” followed by “Are you eating poorly and asking me to buy you a meal?”
‘Why does reaching out first feel so unfamiliar?’
……Come to think of it, Chahyun had always contacted him first before he could feel any gap.
Yiyoung hurriedly checked the texts and call history he’d exchanged with Chahyun’s old number, then felt freshly shocked. It was because the number of times he’d reached out first could be counted on one hand.
