“What are you doing. Lights off and everything.”
The moment Seon Eunhu flipped the switch, the studio flooded with light, and two flushed faces were laid bare without mercy.
It was Lee Jinseong — his classmate from enrollment and the department’s Vice Department Rep — and Kim Hyeseol, a junior a few years below him. I’d never exchanged so much as a word with Hyeseol, but I knew enough to know she was a second-year. I thought I’d caught a glimpse of her in woodworking class once.
“Ah, Hyeseol was just—”
“Hello. I asked my senior if I could borrow something and just came in for a second, so I forgot to turn the lights on! What was it, um, the, the cutter! I needed the cutter just a little bit.”
Before Lee Jinseong could get a word in, Kim Hyeseol, standing beside him, cut him off. Lee Jinseong sniffled awkwardly and looked down at her with an embarrassed expression. For someone who wasn’t small by any means, he was wearing quite a pitiful face.
“…….”
Seon Eunhu held Lee Jinseong’s gaze steadily. At the same time, Lee Jinseong’s inner thoughts began to transmit to him in real time. Arriving through a channel other than his eardrums, they replicated Lee Jinseong’s voice and cadence exactly.
Is he really planning not to say anything to anyone? Even so, keeping it a secret from Seon Eunhu of all people, his closest friend — that’s going too far. …He doesn’t have feelings for her, does he?
While Lee Jinseong was wary of Seon Eunhu as always, Kim Hyeseol was anxious about something else entirely.
Did he see us hugging? Oh please. He couldn’t have, right? I did push away quickly but the door opened first so — maybe it was too dark to see? That’s why I said, why did you suddenly try to set the mood in here. You said no one would come in so don’t worry. Ugh, so annoying. There’s nothing good about people finding out we’re dating.
Seon Eunhu observed their unfiltered inner thoughts at his leisure and clicked his tongue internally. The timing of this encounter was unfortunate. He had no interest in whether those two were secretly dating or mortal enemies, and he had no desire to get awkwardly tangled up between them either. The idea of becoming someone who shared secrets with another person was even more distasteful.
Doesn’t look like we got caught?
Seems like he doesn’t know?
The two of them exchanged glances right in front of Seon Eunhu. It was so clumsy that someone without Mind Reading would undoubtedly have found it suspicious too. And more than anything else—
“Jinseong doesn’t have a cutter.”
“Ah… really?”
Did they really think absolutely no one had caught on to their sloppy secret relationship?
Seon Eunhu looked at Kim Hyeseol, who was flustered and glancing around, and at Lee Jinseong, who was nodding along blankly, with an expression that said he found them hopelessly naive. Just within Seon Eunhu’s own knowledge, several people had already noticed those two.
“If you need a cutter, you go to the equipment room — why come to the third-year studio. What would you do if you went bumping around in the dark and damaged someone’s work?”
It was a gentle tone of voice, but the reproving undertone made Kim Hyeseol’s face stiffen awkwardly. Lee Jinseong belatedly started going “hey, hey” and took a few steps toward Seon Eunhu with his signature affable smile. He’d been elected Vice Department Rep on the strength of that carefully constructed image — one built defensively to mask his real intentions.
“Hey. It’s not like she came in alone, don’t be so hard on her. I was keeping an eye on things the whole time too, making sure nothing would go wrong. Right? You didn’t touch anything? See.”
But he wasn’t as clever as the image he cultivated, and his true colors showed through quickly — that was always his problem. Flustered, Lee Jinseong drew a line between himself and Kim Hyeseol and spoke as if he bore not a shred of blame.
Kim Hyeseol wasn’t some dog off its leash who would have barged in on her own. Lee Jinseong had clearly been the one to lead the way inside, yet watching him talk as if he’d had no choice in the matter was nothing short of pathetic.
Sure enough, Kim Hyeseol, who had nodded along reflexively, now fixed a sharp glare at the back of Lee Jinseong’s head. She was drowning in a wave of intense betrayal.
What? I can’t believe this. He’s the one who dragged me into the studio when I said let’s just go outside, and now — seriously. No wonder people call him Seon Eunhu’s lapdog. What a frustrating idiot. The moment I get out of here, I’m breaking up with him. Good thing we kept it a secret.
The vicious words delivered in her sweet voice made Seon Eunhu look away from them mid-stare. What happened to those two had nothing to do with him. Seon Eunhu simply had two things that bothered him.
Getting tangled up in other people’s private lives.
And the possibility of his work being damaged by outsiders.
The reason Lee Jinseong had launched into such a pathetic excuse first was precisely because he knew how sensitive Seon Eunhu could get about his work.
He had his two-faced moments, but they’d been close long enough that some genuine feeling had taken hold, it seemed. Watching him fail to spare even a thought for his girlfriend’s feelings was honestly sad to see.
Seon Eunhu clicked his tongue internally and waited for the two of them to leave the studio quickly. It looked like it was almost wrapped up. Though it seemed like those two were also about to wrap up, in a different sense.
“I’m sorry. We’ll be going now.”
Kim Hyeseol gave a polite bow to Seon Eunhu and walked past Lee Jinseong without sparing him a glance, coldly brushing him aside. Lee Jinseong seemed to finally realize his mistake, calling after Hyeseol and hurrying out after her.
And with that, the uncomfortable situation resolved itself entirely, and just as Seon Eunhu was finally settling into some peace and quiet—
“Hello.”
A slow voice came from the doorway. That calm, expressionless voice was enough to tell him who had just entered the studio without even turning around.
The one who had made Seon Eunhu — who hated getting entangled in other people’s private lives — willingly get entangled.
And therefore the younger student who had earned the right to handle Seon Eunhu’s work as he pleased.
The sly junior who kept crossing his path again and again ever since he’d returned from leave, and who, without fail, irritated Seon Eunhu a hundred percent of the time whenever they met.
Seon Eunhu turned to the doorway with a look of mild displeasure. And there, as expected, stood Go Taerim — expressionless as an old man who’d weathered every hardship the world had to offer — wearing a vivid blue jumpsuit work uniform that was at complete odds with his composed demeanor.
“You’re here? Good timing. Nice work uniform, too.”
Go Taerim, who couldn’t care less about Seon Eunhu’s compliment, answered flatly and was following Lee Jinseong and Kim Hyeseol with his eyes as they passed.
Wondering what on earth was going through his head, Seon Eunhu looked into Go Taerim’s dark eyes. The voice that came through without fail was full of questions.
Why do those two look so tense? They were having a perfectly fine date until just now — did they fight already? That’s why you shouldn’t have started dating in the first place. Did they really not know they’d end up draining themselves emotionally fighting and fretting over each other like this?
Seon Eunhu looked away from Go Taerim and turned his back. It made him want to laugh — of all people, Go Taerim, who had no interest in the affairs of the world, had noticed those two’s secret relationship. If Go Taerim had picked up on it, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that every student in the Sculpture Department already knew.
Go Taerim, who had been standing alone in front of the half-closed door, quietly pulled it shut. With the click of the door closing, he turned, and his jet-black eyes were as calm as ever. From the gaze that met Seon Eunhu’s, a soft voice came through.
His face really is something. Perfect for clearing your head.
Good grief.
Seon Eunhu barely managed to suppress a derisive laugh.
Maybe it was because a commotion had just passed — Go Taerim’s inner thoughts felt unusually peaceful and harmless. He had no way of knowing what situation he’d just walked into, and yet after watching two people storm out in a huff, the only thing going through his head was an appreciation of Seon Eunhu’s looks. That was so very Go Taerim. The boy whose thoughts swung between the sly and the guileless, whose mental flow was impossible to predict, seemed to live in an entirely different dimension from everyone else.
Go Taerim’s inner world was, for the most part, quiet. Very occasionally, when something troubled him, it would tremble like an earthquake — but strangely, it never lasted long. Even when things felt precarious, the way he steadied himself back to center almost immediately was like watching the base of a supple candle flame.
It was simply that — the novelty of it, the fascination — that made Seon Eunhu feel the occasional urge to prod and provoke him, despite being someone he had no wish to get tangled up with.
“Didn’t wait for my call today? I spent the whole day waiting for you to call.”
“What? You were waiting for my call?”
His offhand, throwaway remark made Go Taerim’s eyes go wide as he asked again. The plain fringe that fell to the upper edge of his eyes, and the clean, lean line of his jaw, gave him an honest, unassuming impression — at odds with the scheming nature underneath.
“Yeah. I called yesterday, so I kind of hoped you’d call me this morning — but nothing came. You’ll call tomorrow, right?”
Seon Eunhu asked, deliberately letting his eyes sparkle. Acting as though he harbored some ulterior motive toward him was the only way Seon Eunhu knew to shake Go Taerim up.
