Faced with a situation that felt like talking to a wall, Moon Heesung pressed his temple and replied with effort.
“…I can’t. Right now.”
At the first refusal he’d ever gotten, Yoo Sinju’s cheek twitched.
“Why can’t you?”
The petulant, childlike question was met by Moon Heesung as calmly as he could manage.
“…My body feels off. It’s dangerous to drive like this.”
“I can’t drive either. I’ve been drinking.”
“Then call another manager.”
“…Another manager?”
Yoo Sinju let out a derisive scoff.
At the unreadable reaction, Moon Heesung’s face gradually lost its composure as he looked at him.
“You came to me first.”
“…….”
“Said you’d be my manager. Didn’t you?”
What a beautiful face it was.
A delicate profile, clear skin, deep-set eyes with a long, sweeping gaze.
The irises within — deep and mysterious as a black hole.
The sharpness that contradicted that spine-tingling beauty made Moon Heesung suddenly feel something familiar.
From childhood. That kid, with such a pretty face, who used to spit out words with no manners at all.
Moon Heesung swallowed the bitter smile that tried to surface and replied in the same exhausted tone as before.
“…You’re right.”
“So I’m giving you the chance to do it. Right now.”
He spoke as though this situation were something Moon Heesung himself had wanted.
Not knowing what had gotten into him, Moon Heesung kept as calm as he could and answered.
“You said you didn’t want me.”
“…….”
“…You hated me so much you collapsed, didn’t you.”
Pressed on the sudden change in attitude, Yoo Sinju’s face twitched.
But he showed no intention of answering — complete silence.
Moon Heesung had no room to wait for a reply.
His whole body was growing hot and even beginning to itch, and he pressed on with difficulty.
“…I can’t drive right now.”
“Do it.”
At the absurd demand, Moon Heesung pinched the corner of his eye and glared at him.
“I told you it’s dangerous.”
“So there are things you’re afraid of after all.”
At the first show of raw emotion, Yoo Sinju curved into a crooked smile.
He’d been acting like he’d walk out and die on the spot if told to — and now, finally seeing him come undone, Yoo Sinju smiled as if he’d known it all along.
“Ha….”
Moon Heesung, without the luxury to engage in petty power games, let out a low exhale.
“It’s not me I’m worried about. It’s you.”
“…….”
“What would happen if you got hurt.”
Moon Heesung let out the words like a deep, weary sigh.
At that, Yoo Sinju went silent again.
The sharp smile vanished almost instantly.
And at the same time, he began to tremble.
Unable to read the emotion behind it, Moon Heesung pressed on as if he couldn’t hold it back.
“I’ll call you a designated driver. Just wait.”
Moon Heesung reached for his phone with a trembling hand and stretched toward the driver’s door to open it.
At that moment, his other hand was caught.
Even the slightest contact set his nerves on edge, and Moon Heesung recoiled with a startled expression, shaking off Yoo Sinju’s hand.
For a moment, Yoo Sinju’s hand floated in the air, caught off guard.
“……Ah….”
He let out a low, quiet sound.
Then, as if his thoughts were tangled, he rubbed a hand down his face and continued.
“…I took something strange.”
“…….”
“My body feels off because of that, so….”
“You’re hard.”
“…….”
Yoo Sinju’s blunt observation cut right through, and Moon Heesung went speechless.
“So were you going to sleep with Park Ian because of that?”
Moon Heesung wasn’t the type to be rattled by topics like this — like he’d been with Park Ian.
But something about it felt different with Yoo Sinju.
It felt like a conversation he shouldn’t be having.
Whether it was because he thought of him as a younger brother. Whether it was confusion over how he’d ended up in this uncomfortable situation. Whether it was simply because none of it made sense to him.
“That’s not it. For starters.”
“Did he suck you off?”
“……Yoo Sinju.”
At the increasingly explicit remarks, Moon Heesung called his name low, as if to say stop.
It was a warning in tone, but Yoo Sinju only let out a hollow laugh.
“So you’re actually the type who’s into it.”
“…….”
“You don’t discriminate — men, women, doesn’t matter to you.”
“…I told you. I took something.”
“So when you’re on something, you’ll roll around with just anyone?”
With no sign of letting up, all Moon Heesung could do was respond as steadily as possible.
“…What is it you’re trying to say.”
“Just stating the facts. That you’re the type who’ll sleep with anyone without a second thought.”
Yoo Sinju said it in a flat, emotionless voice.
Whatever was eating at him, Moon Heesung couldn’t make any sense of it — but he gave him what he wanted anyway.
“Fine. Yeah, I’m easy. I’ll sleep with anyone. That’s what I am. Happy?”
Moon Heesung moved to open the driver’s door again.
He needed to get out of here fast.
Otherwise he felt like his reason would keep slipping away.
“Normally, if someone forces something on you, you’d get angry and try to get away from the situation.”
“…….”
Yoo Sinju ground out each syllable with deliberate weight.
Moon Heesung, already moving to leave, stopped.
“Not just meekly go along with whatever they want and let them have you.”
“…I didn’t let anyone have—”
“So you’ll just sleep with someone if they ask.”
“…….”
“That’s you, isn’t it. Whatever anyone asks of you, you do it without so much as blinking.”
Even through the haze clouding his mind, Moon Heesung tried to find the thread of what Yoo Sinju was actually saying.
That sulky, bristling tone. The look of someone deeply displeased.
He still couldn’t understand it — but Moon Heesung listened carefully to his grievances, studying him with a puzzled expression, searching for an answer.
“Even without the drug, you would’ve just given it to me if I asked. You’re always like that.”
“…….”
“Even the most unreasonable demands — you accept all of them. Not even flinching, not even once — you just do everything, don’t you.”
Yoo Sinju was breathing hard without realizing it.
His chest had begun to heave like someone seething with frustration.
And yet, in contrast to his rising agitation, the dark irises of his eyes were sinking deeper and deeper into shadow.
“If you’d give it to Park Ian when he asks—”
“…….”
“Then you’d spread your legs for me too.”
The moment he heard those words, Moon Heesung’s expression cracked completely.
“What?”
Yoo Sinju exhaled a short, incredulous breath.
He replied with unbothered ease, as if he hadn’t said anything wrong.
“Why? You’ll do it for Park Ian but not for me?”
Moon Heesung fired back with a sigh woven into his voice.
“…Is that it?”
“…….”
“Is that what you want?”
Moon Heesung had been listening the entire time, searching through everything he said for what Yoo Sinju actually wanted.
Behind every complaint laced with criticism, there had to be something he was reaching for.
When Moon Heesung asked back with that exasperated note, the sharp-tongued Yoo Sinju faltered.
Moon Heesung caught himself — did I really just ask that — and dragged a hand roughly down his face, quickly correcting course.
“…Ha, forget it. I’m dizzy right now—”
The drug was dulling his cognition, and Moon Heesung was rambling in a way that was thoroughly unlike him — at which Yoo Sinju suddenly dropped a single remark.
“If that’s the case.”
“…….”
“…If I told you to — could you really go that far?”
A gaze that had sunk somewhere deep landed on his skin.
In that dizzy moment, everything was spinning in confusion — but Moon Heesung could make out one thing clearly.
This was a test. And in another sense — an opportunity.
A chance to earn Yoo Sinju’s trust. To return as his manager.
To finally receive the approval and acceptance he had refused so stubbornly…
Even with his head spinning out of control, that much he could grasp with precision.
But that wasn’t what mattered most.
Blurring eyes quietly fixed on Yoo Sinju.
He knew it was provocation. He knew it was spite.
But Moon Heesung looked at Yoo Sinju as if reading him, his expression endlessly still, and spoke in a voice that had become unmistakably serious.
“Is that really what you want?”
Asked whether he meant it, the other gave no answer.
A face without a trace of humor. A face faintly flushed. An expression saturated with irritation.
Moon Heesung let out a long, sighing breath — the kind that carries resignation — and continued.
“…Fine. Whatever you want.”
He added it like someone accepting the inevitable, breath coming unevenly.
“I told you.”
“…….”
“…I came back to repay what I owe you.”
He responded with the same composure as always, even on a subject this explicit.
As he’d said — demands of a sexual nature weren’t a particularly difficult subject for Moon Heesung.
Moon Heesung met his gaze, eyes reddened from the drug.
Even adrift and unraveling under its influence, there was something in Moon Heesung’s gaze — a particular, unwavering solemnity.
“If that’s what you want.”
“…….”
“……I’ll do anything.”
That was why he had come back.
**
The car ride home was quiet.
In the end, a driver had been called, and Yoo Sinju and Moon Heesung sat side by side in the back seat, both looking away from each other.
An uncomfortable tension hung in the air, but Moon Heesung had no room to concern himself with that.
Breathing itself was growing difficult, and the need to take himself in hand and find release was so pressing his thoughts were spinning.
That he’d endured this long was something no ordinary person could have managed.
It was only possible because it was Moon Heesung — the one they called iron-willed.
Whether or not Yoo Sinju knew the state he was in, the moment they arrived he dragged Moon Heesung along without a word.
Moon Heesung stopped in his tracks and said with everything he had left.
“I have to go.”
It was already nearly impossible to speak.
But even at words that bordered on pleading, Yoo Sinju gave no concession.
He pulled Moon Heesung inside the house in one sweep, then unhurriedly shrugged off his own coat.
“…What are you doing.”
“What do you mean. You said it yourself.”
The offhand remark was met with Moon Heesung’s expressionless stare.
“That you’d do anything I want.”
“…….”
“I want to test that loyalty a little.”
“…….”
“Take care of it here.”
“…What?”
