They had finished their meal so sedately that Hongdan thought perhaps the remaining day would pass by peacefully. But the moment they left the restaurant, Seonha grabbed Hongdan’s arm and draped his entire body weight on him.
“Let’s go on an outing, an outing!”
“What outing?! Say something that makes sense to someone who just got off work!”
Going on about an outing with just that word alone was absurd.
As Hongdan struggled not to be dragged along by Seonha’s tremendous strength, he recalled a passage from world literature he’d read as a child.
‘Security is mortals’ chiefest enemy.’
Act 3, Scene 5 of Macbeth. It was a legendary quote from the great witch Hecate as she scolded her underlings for daring to bestow the noble grace of prophecy upon a lunatic bastard like Macbeth.
These words were the most exhilarating expression that penetrated that lunatic’s entire life, while simultaneously being another grace that Shakespeare bestowed upon the still foolish Macbeths of this world. When Hongdan had first encountered that sentence, he had nodded his head several times, thinking that the modifier “world’s greatest master” wasn’t attached for nothing.
And now.
Having lived through this harsh world and ultimately forgotten that kind prophecy to become a lunatic himself, Hongdan felt confident he wouldn’t stop at just nodding his head. He was in a state of mind where he’d spin a penitent’s hat dance ten thousand times if asked.
Even if it was a gesture no different from throwing an egg at a rock, one must at least try something. Hongdan first tried twisting the arm that Seonha had firmly grabbed. Naturally, he didn’t forget to glance around, conscious of people’s gazes. Even if press photos were taken, he refused to be caught looking like this.
“You crazy bastard, let go of this and then talk, seriously!”
“No! Then you’ll run away! Like when we went on that school trip and you lied about riding the horse with me, then went off to ride the zipline alone. Who do you think doesn’t know that Choi Hongdan’s specialty is running away!”
Damn perceptive bastard.
As expected, rather than loosening his grip even a little, Seonha pulled even harder, making them draw even closer. Looking at the distance between them now—barely two steps—Hongdan cursed under his breath.
Fortunately, thanks to wrapping his own coat around him like a hijab again when they left the restaurant, it seemed no one thought this guy was ‘that’ Yeon Seonha.
Unless they just thought he was a crazy person.
But at this point, Hongdan almost wished this clingy fool would be recognized as Yeon Seonha, the precious only son of Yeonhwa Group.
He secretly hoped for that common development where that pretentious family would slap him and sternly tell him never to approach their son again—they didn’t even need to give him a money envelope, just remove this person from his sight. Whether Yeon Seonha died of lovesickness afterward, filming Romeo and Juliet alone, was none of Hongdan’s concern.
To begin with, Seonha and he weren’t in some relationship like those tragic lovers who fell in love at first sight in their still-green youth and continued a passionate romance, or anything like that.
However, he realized that if Seonha’s parents really found out—especially if Seonha’s mother, Han Eunjae, saw Hongdan clinging to him again—there was no way she’d let him off with just a slap. She’d probably start by destroying the jeonse apartment he’d barely managed to secure.
Recalling just how vicious his fucking mother-in-law had been, Hongdan decided to first appease the annoying twenty-nine-year-old who was all worked up. He stopped his feeble resistance—not even a quail egg, let alone an egg before a rock—and moved right up to Seonha, drawn by the force pulling him. Then, gritting his teeth, he spoke in a low voice.
“…Thirty minutes. That’s it.”
“Okay! If you don’t believe me, Hongdan, you can set a timer on your phone.”
Seonha, who had been making a tearful face with both his eyes and mouth corners drooping the whole time, broke into a bright smile as if nothing had happened.
“……”
That unfamiliar face stirred an odd sense of alienation. Even though it was perhaps an ordinary, common smile that he’d occasionally encountered since yesterday, it strangely made Hongdan feel uncomfortable.
Was it because this guy didn’t used to smile like this?
No, maybe he just never smiled like this in front of me.
Perhaps to all those omegas…….
Hongdan turned away without a word.
“I don’t want to put that much effort into you.”
Then he spoke in a resolute voice, as if hypnotizing himself. His steps forward were also unwavering and straight.
Nevertheless, that innocent laughter didn’t diminish at all. Seonha quickly trotted over and stuck close to Hongdan’s left side. On his annoyingly handsome face was the clearest of smiles.
“I don’t care. Because Hongdan said he’d go on an outing with me.”
His voice flowed out, unable to hide his joy. It was the kind of thing that would make even the person next to him feel tingly, but Hongdan’s eyes as he glanced up at Seonha remained dry. The focus was blurred, as if something had been overlaid on them.
Hongdan soon bit down hard on his lower lip and turned his head forward. After that, no matter what he heard from the side, he didn’t respond with anything other than “yeah” or “no.”
It didn’t take long for Seonha to notice Hongdan’s sharply sunken mood. His mouth also slowly closed. Though his gaze remained on the other person, he didn’t force conversation. He simply matched his pace to Hongdan’s steps. His hands clasped behind his back, lest they brush against Hongdan’s hand and break his quiet reverie.
Come to think of it, Hongdan’s cheeks always had a blush blooming as prettily as his name.
Throughout their walk toward a nearby park, Seonha kept stealing glances at Hongdan. But unlike what he remembered, Hongdan’s face right now was only expressionless.
……Did I really make him wither?
Between Hongdan and himself was only about a hand’s width of space. Just one more step and he could claim the spot next to Hongdan, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. No, his heart was desperate, but his legs were heavy as if a 20kg weight was attached.
It was only one step.
“Let’s go togeth……”
For Seonha, it was too far away.
***
Hongdan’s mouth, which had remained shut the whole time, opened when they’d been walking the park trail for about five minutes.
“Ah.”
It was a single syllable close to a meaningless exclamation, but Seonha thrust his face forward as if he’d been waiting.
“Why? Did you leave something behind? Or now that we’re here, is there something you want to do?”
How had he been holding back all this time?
Seonha returned the single syllable Hongdan uttered with several times as many questions.
Hongdan narrowed his brow slightly and pulled his body back. It was partly because this puppy-like reaction was burdensome, but also because Seonha had approached right up to his nose while he’d let his guard down for a moment.
As he pulled away, Hongdan glimpsed Seonha’s right forearm twitching. He chose not to pay it any mind and continued the conversation.
“Nothing I left behind, but there is something I’ve wanted to throw away since yesterday.”
You, or my ex-husband, or just Yeon Seonha.
However, even though two days had passed living together, Seonha didn’t seem to imagine at all that Hongdan might harbor hostility toward him, and was busy waving his raised hand like an elementary school student excited to have encountered a problem he knew in class.
“What is it? When we get home later, I’ll throw it away! Let me do it, let me.”
Hongdan knew that foolish arm would come right down once he swallowed his answer. So instead of scolding him not to get ahead of himself, he cast a warm glance his way. Why, don’t parents usually buy their sons pork cutlet before taking them to the dentist?
“Really? You’ll throw it away?”
“Yeah! I should at least earn my keep. Hongdan doesn’t have money, so I can’t keep draining the household.”
Then leave.
Hongdan forcibly swallowed the retort that instinctively wanted to come out. Then he started playing twenty questions with this child desperate for attention.
“First of all, it looks pretty on the outside.”
“Uh-huh. But?”
“But it’s completely useless, you know. No, I don’t know if it’s cursed or what, but just being near it makes me fucking miserable.”
“Whoa! We should throw it out right away!”
“Right? And it smells a bit too. Like a dirty mop.”
“You had something like that at home?”
“I thought I’d thrown it away, but it was still there. Oh, and it’s kind of big too. I don’t know if you can throw it away by yourself……”
“It’s okay. I’m super strong. You just got dragged along earlier, didn’t you, Hongdan?”
But perhaps because Seonha had lived his whole life without needing to read the room, he seemed like someone who’d donated all his tact to the unemployed uncle next door.
At that innocent response, sharp thorns sprouted again in Hongdan’s eyes, which had briefly held a gentle look.
“……Is that really appropriate to say to me right now, Yeon Seonha?”
Just from how he scratched the back of his head sheepishly instead of apologizing for the sharp look or being flustered by the changed atmosphere, that idiot would never know in his entire life how much effort it took for Hongdan not to put “fucking” before his name.
“Ah…… but Hongdan was pretty cute earlier.”
The words that followed were also truly simple-hearted beyond comparison. And what was with that inexplicable blush? Just like an elementary schooler confessing about a girl he likes at a gathering of adults…….
No, that’s bullshit.
Hongdan quickly cut off the imagination that didn’t suit Seonha.
He just looked up at Seonha’s face—though he had absolutely no idea why he had such an embarrassed expression—and made plans for tomorrow’s salary heist. To search whether there were cases where people’s personalities changed when they lost their memory, especially cases where intelligence dropped severely. And he decided to quit this stress-inducing twenty questions game right here.
“So what is it you want to throw away?”
But the words he’d thrown out meaninglessly seemed to have stuck quite importantly with Seonha. When Hongdan tried to naturally shift the topic of conversation while postponing his answer, Seonha pulled it back to the center. He seemed quite curious about what Hongdan wanted to throw away.
Geez. Obsessing over weird things.
Hongdan, who had been walking slowly, soon stopped his legs.
“Is that important to you?”
It was a question asked with genuine curiosity, without sarcasm.
Honestly, since they’d decided not to kick him out for the next three months anyway, there was no need to make a good impression on him, was there?
But Seonha was unusually affectionate. Like at the snack restaurant earlier, and now acting like he’d do anything—it was all like that.
Really not like ‘Yeon Seonha.’
So this was a question most people who knew him well before he lost his memory wouldn’t be able to resist, and Hongdan also blurted it out unconsciously.
If Seonha had answered nonchalantly while keeping that grinning smile, it would have been a question that could have just passed lightly.
To put it differently, in the end.
“……”
This meant that right now, Seonha’s face was completely frozen to the point of feeling cold.
Hongdan was momentarily swept up in a strange emotion. This expression was more familiar to him on Seonha.
Therefore, an old habit naturally emerged. Hongdan’s right hand slowly moved toward Seonha’s cheek.
“Why are you suddenly……”
But just as his fingertips were about to touch his cheek.
“It’s important.”
A deeply lowered voice flowed into his ear. Hongdan’s arm stopped right there. For the first time since reuniting with Seonha, Hongdan’s body shrank in surprise at his presence. That’s how raw Seonha’s face was right now.
“……Huh?”
Hongdan’s right hand, which had lost its destination and was floating in the air, was soon caught by Seonha’s left hand.
That guy’s right-handed, so why does he keep acting strange…….
That hand was the one Hongdan liked to steal glances at, full of the wounds he’d left just yesterday.
“Important, I said. To me.”
It was the left hand, so familiar that the moment its warmth was transmitted, it immediately transported Hongdan back to those times.
It was wrapped around him with that cruel thing. Tenderly, even.
