At the serious face, Jae-min let out an empty laugh.
“I know that.”
“Good if there’s no misunderstanding. Anyway, what I’m saying is it’s a natural reaction.”
Yong-seok got up from his seat. After shaking out and straightening his wrinkled doctor’s gown, he looked at his watch and waved his hand toward Jae-min.
“Anyway, good work coming in even on the weekend. Go home quickly.”
It was already afternoon. Jae-min stretched and got up. Originally a day he didn’t work, he’d come out solely because of Hyun-woong. After going straight to the changing room to change clothes, Jae-min left the clinic without hesitation.
After leaving work, Jae-min headed straight home. Though it was afternoon, since the sun hadn’t set yet, he could fully feel the still bright weather. Because of the warm temperature, by the time he reached home, he’d broken out in a slight sweat. He wiped his forehead with his sleeve and entered the house.
Whether the family had all gone out, inside the house was dark and quiet. Jae-min picked up a snack bag placed on the dining table and entered his room.
Jae-min, who plopped down in the chair in front of his desk, lazily opened the snack bag. While rolling a small snack around with his tongue, he just stared at the ceiling. Since the house was quiet and there was nothing particular to do today, various thoughts continued one after another in a chain.
Especially filling his mind densely and cloudily was thinking about a certain man who was no different from an enemy.
He recalled the large chest that filled and overflowed his hand. Also the appearance of groaning while attached to the glass breast pump tube, flinching his large body.
‘Since we squeezed it today, will milk not come out for a while?’
He recalled the white breast milk that had filled the glass tube cloudily. Crunch, the snack broke between Jae-min’s teeth.
‘How long is a while?’
He took out a new snack and put it in his mouth. He chewed firmly with his molars. Next time, before attaching the breast pump machine, should he try squeezing by hand once, and curiosity arose about how much would come out. When it flowed down in streams just from someone lightly hitting his chest.
‘If it happens again at school, should I pretend not to know?’
When the time came to visit the clinic again, with milk accumulated in his chest, the same situation as last time would happen. He was also curious whether he could avoid getting caught by others until the end.
In Jae-min’s view, Hyun-woong was completely careless. It seemed like it was only a matter of time before he got caught by university people. As the days got hotter, wearing outerwear would look suspicious too. It was also questionable how long he could hide the gauze attached to his nipples.
Jae-min, who put his hand into the rustling snack bag, hesitated. There was something other than hard snacks. When he took it out, it was a tiny marshmallow.
Jae-min, who pinched the marshmallow between his thumb and index finger, pressed it by applying force to his fingers. The soft marshmallow easily squashed, then when he released the force, it returned to its original state.
‘The texture was similar to this…’
Jae-min’s eyes widened sharply as he was mindlessly playing with the marshmallow. The moment he realized what he was recalling while touching the small, soft marshmallow, his back felt eerie. It was none other than Hyun-woong’s nipples.
Unlike his huge, hard body, small and squishy, and even dripping white liquid…
“Hup.”
Jae-min, who jumped up as if struck by lightning on his back, hastily put the marshmallow in his mouth and quickly chewed and swallowed it. Then he roughly tousled and shook his head with his hands. As if doing so would make the face filling his mind fly away.
“Ugh, fuck! I need to stop thinking about it.”
He felt bad about himself for keeping thinking about Hyun-woong. It was when Jae-min, who roughly dumped the remaining snacks into his mouth, picked up his phone.
Just at good timing, a message flew in.
[Na Min-jeong: What are you doing? I’m with Hye-young unnie, anyone coming out?]
It was a message Min-jeong the vocalist sent to the band Fake Lightning group chat. Drummer Chi-won and bassist Woo-seok quickly sent answers that they could come out. Jae-min, who had been looking at the screen with narrowed brows, also sent a reply. It was a question asking where to come out to.
After sending the message, Jae-min grabbed outerwear and wallet and left the room. After checking his appearance once in the mirror, he put on shoes.
Getting some fresh air would blow away the distracting thoughts. Thinking it worked out well, he left the house.
⁕⁕⁕
“Oh, Lim Jae-min’s here!”
The band members were gathered at the park. Jae-min, who had been walking leisurely, spotted his friends and raised his arm. Unusually, all of the Fake Lightning members were out.
“How did you all gather so quickly? I came out as soon as I got the message too.”
“We all happened to be out. I was at a PC cafe with this guy too.”
Woo-seok, the leader and bassist, shrugged his shoulders while pointing at Chi-won, the drummer.
“What were you doing? Were you sleeping?”
“I was coming back from my part-time job.”
“Ah, that new one you started? How is it? Is it manageable?”
“It’s manageable. They pay well too.”
As Jae-min plopped down on the bench, Hye-young pulled out a convenience store bag. She took out canned beers from it and handed one to everyone.
“What kind of part-time job are you doing?”
Hye-young asked as she handed Jae-min a canned beer. At those words, everyone’s eyes sparkled with curiosity as they looked at Jae-min. Although he’d mentioned he had a part-time job, he’d never explained what kind of work it was, so everyone seemed curious.
But he couldn’t tell them the truth. It seemed like it would take a while to explain, and the clinic itself valued privacy so it was awkward to mention. And besides, ordinary people would obviously be disgusted by it. Just like Jae-min when he first visited the clinic.
“Just… helping out at my uncle’s workplace.”
Jae-min vaguely brushed it off and opened his can to take a sip of beer. Chi-won furrowed his brow.
“Ugh, lucky. I need to find work quickly too.”
“Me too. When will we be able to perform again? Even if we don’t get much, it was nice to do what we love on stage and make money at the same time.”
Hye-young let out a long sigh with a face full of regret. Everyone nodded in agreement. Min-jeong, sitting on the bench, stretched out her legs with a gloomy expression.
“I want to sing even if I don’t get paid.”
“I know. We had fun at the festival.”
When Jae-min responded flatly to Min-jeong’s words, her eyes lit up as she turned to look at him.
“Right? We were the most popular back then. We got first place in the popularity vote! We’re going to enter this year too, right?”
The Daedongjae would come around again this year. Jae-min held the can to his lips as he recalled last year’s festival. May, before summer arrived, the weather that day was clear with a cool breeze and not much fine dust. He remembered the heat and cheers of the people gathered in front of the stage.
“Mm, I want to enter too. As long as the timing works out.”
“Let’s do it! Let’s do it!”
At Jae-min’s positive response, Min-jeong excitedly stomped her feet. Hye-young, who had been listening quietly, suddenly clapped her hands.
“Ah, talking about the festival reminds me of something. That guy who was way in the back during Daedongjae was right in front during the last song.”
At Hye-young’s words, Chi-won made a face and twisted his lips.
“There were so many people, how do you remember that, Hye-young noona?”
“I remember. Because he was pretty good-looking.”
Hye-young’s eyes sparkled as she gave a thumbs up. At those words, the male members let out hollow laughs. Jae-min looked at Hye-young with one corner of his mouth twisted up.
“Memorable enough to stay vivid in your memory?”
“Well, handsome guys are rare these days. There are lots of pretty girls but really no good-looking guys.”
“I’m right here, noona.”
Jae-min tapped his chest. Then Min-jeong, who was next to him, screamed.
“So annoying!”
But her expression wasn’t really one of disgust. Jae-min glanced at Min-jeong, who was giggling, and looked at Hye-young with a confident air. Hye-young smiled mischievously as she looked Jae-min up and down, then shrugged her shoulders.
“Lim Jae-min is handsome. But I’ve seen Jae-min’s face so much that I’ve gotten kind of used to it.”
“Ha, used to it?”
When Jae-min’s eyes widened in disbelief, Min-jeong chimed in too.
“Right. And since we won’t be on stage for a while, we’re only seeing your plain look which is a bit disappointing. When we went all out with makeup, Jae-min was amazing. You were practically an idol.”
“Right? Your current face is a bit disappointing.”
At the two female members giggling and agreeing, Jae-min laughed helplessly.
“My pride is hurt.”
