“That too… and you cook all my meals, so I don’t even know how to cook.”
“That’s my strategy, I’m telling you.”
“Smart…”
I mumbled weakly with slightly slurred pronunciation, my cheek pressed against my arm. Between the emotional drain on an empty stomach since last night and suffering from morning sickness since this morning, I had no strength in my body at all. Even though it had calmed down a bit, my stomach still churned faintly, grating on my nerves.
“Get up, let’s eat.”
Won Dogyeong, who had set down the rice bowls in both hands, tapped me as I lay face down.
While I sluggishly got up, he brought soup and side dishes to set the table, then after putting down the last plate, he stood there for a moment as if pondering something before asking.
“Want to eat in the living room?”
You already set everything up though?
“I’ll hold your hand next to you. Your stomach still isn’t good, is it?”
I weighed the annoyance of going to the living room against a slightly more comfortable meal, then soon nodded. The moment permission was granted, Won Dogyeong moved everything that was on the dining table to the living room table.
Me? I struggled to move while carrying just my rice bowl and soup bowl…
As I sat leaning against the sofa, Won Dogyeong put down his spoon and chopsticks, sat right next to me, and grabbed my left hand. This bastard is definitely thinking of this as legitimate skinship while he’s at it.
But wait a minute.
“You can’t eat like this.”
We’re both right-handed. How are you going to eat with your left hand?
“This won’t work, let’s just eat.”
I tried to pull out my captured hand, but failed because Won Dogyeong held on with strength.
“I don’t want to. You eat first.”
“It’ll all get cold.”
“I eat well even when it’s cold. Just hurry up and eat.”
Looking at that determined expression, it seemed he had no intention of letting go of my hand. It would be better if I just ate quickly.
I scooped up some seaweed soup first and swallowed it. As soon as food entered, I suddenly felt hungry and scooped up a big spoonful of rice and put it in my mouth. Won Dogyeong sat idly next to me as I chewed, then reached over the sofa to grab the remote.
“Can I watch TV?”
“Yeah.”
He flipped through channels a few times before stopping at some terrestrial channel. It seemed to be a rerun of episode 1 of some romance drama.
“This started yesterday and they say it’s interesting.”
Won Dogyeong tended to watch quite a lot of dramas and movies. He seemed to think of it as work too. He watched a lot regardless of whether they were Korean or foreign productions. When he had no work, he would watch OTT day and night in the living room. Since I ended up watching next to him, I knew the contents of most dramas pretty well.
The tofu is delicious.
Episode 1, which I started watching almost from the end, was mainly about the two protagonists’ haphazard meeting and bickering. I stuffed rice in my mouth while occasionally raising my head to follow the content. As I watched, I felt like the male protagonist’s face on screen seemed familiar.
“Didn’t you do something with that person?”
“We filmed a movie together. It was quite a while ago, but you recognized him well.”
“Oh, are you close?”
“…Not really.”
Won Dogyeong also appears on TV, but to me he was still closer to a friend than an actor, so it’s still sometimes amazing that Won Dogyeong knows people who appear on TV.
By the time episode 2, which aired consecutively, was starting, I emptied my rice bowl and put down my spoon and chopsticks.
“I’m done eating. You eat.”
“Come over here.”
Won Dogyeong jumped up and came to my right side, then pushed me to the side where he had been sitting. This time, conversely, he grabbed my right hand and started eating while focusing on the drama.
I’m done eating though. You don’t need to hold my hand.
That thought crossed my mind, but I stayed quiet. I mean, well… it’s not bad.
Episode 2 was about the male protagonist’s past. Mainly about how miserably he lived.
From moving to a semi-basement due to his father’s business failure, to losing his younger sibling in a traffic accident, to his mother passing away from illness and the house flooding during the rainy season on the day the funeral ended. It was nothing but misery porn.
The problem was that even though I was thinking that in my head, he kept looking so pitiful that my eyes stung. I kept my mouth firmly shut and pressed down the rising emotions, but from when the protagonist faced the completely flooded house, tears finally started streaming down.
Ah, here we go again.
Now that the morning sickness had relatively subsided, this seemed to be acting up instead. Knowing what was causing it made it less embarrassing, but that didn’t stop the tears.
This damn thing…
As I was irritably wiping tears with my left sleeve, Won Dogyeong, who had turned around unconsciously with his mouth full of something, opened his eyes wide in shock.
“Why, why are you crying?”
“They say this can happen.”
“What.”
He put down his chopsticks and floundered around trying to say something, but perhaps because he had too much in his mouth, he coughed slightly and quickly swallowed.
In the meantime, the protagonist on screen was struggling to salvage family keepsakes from the flooded house, and I was busy wiping away surging tears. Snot also flowed, making me sniffle constantly.
“Are you crying because of the drama?”
Won Dogyeong put his hand on my shoulder with a flustered expression and pulled out tissues to wipe my face. It makes sense. He probably hasn’t seen me cry since elementary school either.
“No… it’s because I’m pregnant… *sniffle*.”
“Hey… don’t cry.”
As I continued to cry, he threw the wet tissue aside and repeated pulling out new ones to wipe my face. After wiping my face like that several times, he suddenly started staring at me intently. Then he started giggling with an enigmatic expression.
“Is this funny? …*sniff*.”
“It’s not funny, just a bit…”
“What.”
“It’s fresh.”
I pushed his shoulder with embarrassment and annoyance. Won Dogyeong kept grinning without breaking down, then pulled me into a hug as I continued to intermittently sniffle.
I didn’t even have the strength to push him away, so I buried my face in his t-shirt and cried some more. Rather, because Won Dogyeong blocked the TV, the tears stopped quickly.
“Move.”
I pulled out tissues with rough movements, blew my nose, and pushed Won Dogyeong away. He obediently stepped back, but his t-shirt had tear stains I’d left dotted all over it.
…There might be snot stains too.
This is revenge for laughing, you bastard.
“Let’s watch something else.”
Won Dogyeong picked up the remote with an expression half apologetic, half dying of laughter, lowering his eyebrows. Before he could change the channel, I quickly snatched the remote.
“It’s fine.”
“Something else…”
“Ah, just watch it.”
I answered bluntly and threw the remote onto the sofa. Won Dogyeong, unable to hide his laughter, just rolled his eyes around, then fumblingly grabbed my hand again with his left hand while pretending to eat seaweed soup. I thought about pulling it away completely, but since he was squeezing my hand tightly without knowing anything, I just left it.
Sulking and stuff like this is what Won Dogyeong does.
This is all because of hormones. I feel so wronged I could die.
*
“I can’t see the car keys.”
“They’re here.”
When he spoke while rummaging on the shelf, I held up the car keys I was holding in my left hand to show him, and Won Dogyeong came to the entrance and crumpled his sneakers on. Perhaps because the temperature was high today, coming out in a shirt and thin cardigan, it felt a bit hot. Well, lately even wearing just a shirt during the day has been a bit hot.
I hope the morning sickness subsides before midsummer comes. Summer is already terrible for me, and if I keep feeling nauseous like this, I might collapse. At home it’s a bit better because Won Dogyeong is here, but at the company there’s nothing I can do about it.
I was blankly staring at the elevator numbers changing when my hand was suddenly grabbed, and when I turned around, Won Dogyeong played dumb and acted innocent.
“In case your stomach isn’t good. Since you have to get in the car.”
When I narrowed my eyes and looked at him, he shamelessly widened his eyes saying “What?”
Since we went to the main house, he’s been timing it opportunistically like this to quietly grab my hand. It is necessary, but somehow I feel like I’ve been drawn in.
From getting off the elevator to walking to the car, Won Dogyeong kept swinging our clasped hands back and forth in small movements. He giggled as if he found it funny too, then opened his mouth.
“This reminds me of when we were young.”
“We used to hold hands and walk around?”
“No, when we were little kids. Hey, I was popular when I was young.”
Ah, younger than me. Feeling unnecessarily embarrassed, I scanned the parking lot with my eyes once.
“Nice that you were popular.”
Not just when he was young—Won Dogyeong has never not been popular regardless of age. At least from age 7 onwards, as far as I know. Even in high school, older girls from a year above called me out and asked if I was dating Won Dogyeong. Mm, that was scary.
“You were popular too.”
Won Dogyeong, who had been looking at me with a strange expression, blurted out.
“Me? Was I when I was young? I don’t even remember.”
“No, not that. In high school. In middle school too.”
I don’t have any memory of that.
I opened the car door and fastened my seatbelt. Won Dogyeong started the engine and turned on the air conditioner weakly. Seeing him take off his zip-up hoodie and throw it in the back seat, he must have been hot too.
“No I wasn’t.”
“No, you were. Anyway, that’s not the important part—can I release pheromones?”
“Why all of a sudden?”
It was a question that seemed odd considering he’d been doing it for days.
“Is it okay to go to the company covered in my pheromones?”
“Ah.”
I’d forgotten. It’s not just me who can smell them.
Won Dogyeong also seemed flustered, as if he’d suddenly realized, recalling the past few days when he’d been releasing pheromones to his heart’s content.
I could be misunderstood as someone with a fussy partner who marks with pheromones, or someone who came after spending a passionate… night.
