“You said you were curious. Why don’t you just ask me directly.”
“Ask what.”
“My life plans.”
“I was just curious after hearing about Suhyeok’s tutoring kid. Made me wonder if alphas are all like that.”
“I haven’t finished making my plans yet. There are too many variables in life—”
“Variables — what do you mean by that?”
“The plans I made before all fell apart.”
“Sounds like Suhyeok’s tutoring kid really is mature for his age. Apparently he’s already mapped out everything from who he’s going to marry to how many kids he wants.”
“Someone to marry….”
Eunho, who had been murmuring as if to himself, turned to look at Doyun.
“You want someone chosen for you too?”
Press.
Eunho’s fingertip pressed firmly into Doyun’s stomach, like someone pinpointing the exact right answer. It was his stomach that Eunho’s hand had touched — but for some reason, Doyun’s lips felt suddenly, inexplicably dry.
***
Eunho kept stroking Doyun’s leg up and down. As he adjusted his grip to work out the knotted muscles with just the right amount of pressure, a soft, involuntary moan slipped from between Doyun’s teeth. When Doyun murmured “not there — a little higher,” Eunho wrapped his large hand around the upper part of his calf and continued the massage. Suhyeok and Minjun, sitting in front of them, were completely absorbed in their game — mouths half-open, fingers the only things moving. The clicking of the joystick buttons was loud and relentless.
“By the way, when do you want to get married?”
At Doyun’s question, Eunho let out a small, quiet laugh. Doyun wanted to believe he’d misread it, but that soft sound was unmistakably a scoff.
“…Who knows. I’m not sure about marriage. I’ve never seen it end well.”
The sounds of Minjun and Suhyeok’s game echoed through the living room. Every now and then came a loud bang or crash, and dramatic, tension-building music swelled from the screen. But to Doyun, the sound that came through clearest of all was Eunho’s low, quiet voice right beside him.
At some point, Eunho had rolled up the loose fabric of Doyun’s pants to the middle of his thigh. Watching Eunho run his hand plainly over the exposed skin felt a little awkward and embarrassing. In an attempt to break through that awkwardness, Doyun added something he didn’t really need to say.
“Well — are there no decent omegas around you?”
“…Is that what you’re curious about?”
At Doyun’s question, Eunho’s expression darkened in an instant. Whenever that ever-present faint smile disappeared from his face, his soft features turned cold just as quickly. Caught off guard by the shift, Doyun started fumbling over his words.
“No, I just — I was just asking, that’s all. It’s absolutely not that I’m interested in omegas, and, ah, I’m a beta so… and since I’m not an alpha or an omega I don’t really know… but I heard most of them get married young. I was just a little curious, that’s all.”
“Not all of them are like that. And it’s not like an alpha absolutely has to be with an omega.”
“Ah…. Is that so.”
“Yeah.”
The reply was cold and clipped — a clear signal that he had no interest in continuing the conversation. Doyun promptly shut his mouth. The silence that fell between them was filled by the flashy sound effects of the game.
As the silence dragged on, Doyun stole a sidelong glance at Eunho’s profile. Even while feeling uneasy, Doyun found himself quietly marveling at Eunho’s face. The clean line of his profile, drawn as if with a careful hand, flowed smoothly all the way down to the prominent ridge of his throat.
Is he mad? Why? Because I asked if he was going to get married young?
If it were Suhyeok or Minjun acting like this, Doyun would’ve just given them a light smack and moved on — but he couldn’t do that with Eunho.
He couldn’t exactly rank his friendships, but if he had to think about it, Doyun was most open with Suhyeok. When it came to friends he could trust and lean on, Suhyeok was the unrivaled answer there too. Minjun wasn’t the deepest thinker, but he was someone Doyun could always talk to comfortably.
Eunho, though, was hard to neatly define. Before summer break, the time Doyun spent with Eunho had far outweighed the time he spent with the others. They met nearly every day and shared the same space even when there was nothing in particular to do. That had just been Doyun’s ordinary everyday life.
Eunho could feel easy to be around one moment, and then suddenly difficult the next. It wasn’t that Eunho was ever demanding or got upset over trivial things — if anything, it was the opposite. He was unreasonably easygoing, and in situations where anyone else would have been angry, he’d just laugh it off. And yet, there was something about Eunho that put people on edge.
“What were you so busy with all break?”
Doyun, who had been watching Eunho carefully, shifted the subject to change the atmosphere. He tried to keep his tone as natural as possible, not wanting it to show that he was overthinking it.
At Doyun’s question, Eunho turned his head and looked at him. The quiet, steady gaze felt like a lot to bear, and Doyun subtly looked away.
“There were several places I needed to show my face at for family matters. In the US, I had some personal things to take care of, so I was in Chicago — then right before break ended, I went straight to Hong Kong to see my mom.”
“Ah, that must’ve been exhausting.”
“I get that they divorced and can’t stand the sight of each other, but it felt a little unfair that I was the only one running back and forth. Well — it’s all over now, so.”
Eunho always mentioned things like this — personal matters that could be uncomfortable to bring up — as if they were nothing at all. Even when his parents had gone from separation to divorce and each started seeing someone new, he’d been just as open about it. Every time Doyun heard things like this, he wasn’t sure how to respond. Eunho seemed too unbothered for a halfhearted word of comfort, and yet Doyun didn’t have the nerve to crack a casual joke about something as complicated as a broken family.
“I spent break going to English classes with Minjun…. Four hours a day. Did you know that?”
“I drove you when you registered for that class. Of course I knew.”
When Eunho accurately pronounced the name of the English academy Doyun had attended, Doyun let out a small sound of impressed surprise. Over the summer break, Doyun and Minjun had attended a TOEFL prep academy together. Originally all three — Suhyeok included — were supposed to go together, but Suhyeok, who had been buried in group projects and assignments the previous semester, declared he wanted to rest this break and gave up on English study.
“Oh, and — I’m going on an overseas trip this winter.”
In the middle of talking about himself to Eunho, Doyun brought up the family trip that had been decided not long ago. The excitement in his voice came through completely unguarded.
“Where to?”
Eunho’s hand, which had been lazily rolling across Doyun’s knee, slipped under the rolled-up fabric of his pants and began trailing along the inside of his thigh.
It was a slightly intimate area to be touched so freely — but Doyun knew this kind of casual physical contact was just one of Eunho’s habits, so he made his objection known by pressing his legs together. Maybe it was because they hadn’t seen each other in a while, but the physical affection that normally didn’t bother him at all felt unfamiliar and a little too much today.
“Thailand. But my sister’s company won’t give her the time off, so it’s a three-night, five-day itinerary. Is that even possible?”
“So you’d be sleeping on the plane? That sounds exhausting.”
Rather than slipping free, Eunho’s hand — trapped between Doyun’s pressed-together legs — pushed even deeper inside. Doyun reached down and pulled Eunho’s hand out from between his thighs. Eunho glanced briefly down at the hand Doyun had grabbed, and his eyes narrowed slightly. Doyun smiled at him and tossed out a joke.
“I’ll bring you back a wallet with an elephant on it.”
Eunho smiled back at him, and this time his hand slipped inside Doyun’s t-shirt, softly grazing over his stomach.
“If you’re the one giving it to me, I’ll have to switch to that wallet.”
“Everyone will laugh at you if you’re walking around with something like that.”
Eunho typically dressed in achromatic, neutral colors. His clothes almost never had eye-catching design details, and were mostly made from soft, high-end fabrics. The thought of Eunho — who dressed like that — carrying around a wallet plastered with bold elephant print was enough to make Doyun laugh just imagining it.
“I wore an elephant t-shirt before, though.”
Eunho said with a smile, still looking at Doyun. At that, Doyun cried out “Ah, I remember!” and burst into laughter. A few years ago, Suhyeok had gone on a three-night, five-day trip to Thailand with his family. He came back with four t-shirts as souvenirs — each one printed with a flamboyant gold foil elephant.
The t-shirts all had the same elephant print but came in different colors, and whether it was Suhyeok’s idea of thoughtfulness or not, each color happened to be their favorite. Eunho got black, Minjun got blue, and Doyun got green.
After a few washes, half the gold foil had flaked off the loud design and the necklines had stretched out beyond saving. Even so, there was something about the way it draped softly against the body that Doyun liked, and he still wore it at home every now and then.
“Yeah, fair point actually. I still wear mine as pajamas at night.”
“Maybe I’ll wear mine too. Let me dig it out — we can match.”
