Lee Hyeonseok finally let go of my hand around the time I thought my wrist might actually break. My wrist fortunately didn’t break, but he’d gripped it so hard that my hand was swollen and bright red. Blue was slowly appearing too, so it seemed a bruise would form. He was truly a crazy bastard overflowing with fundamental insanity.
“Ugh…”
Curses rose up to the back of my throat, but I only let out a groan, fearing that otherwise I’d really have to say goodbye to my wrist. It hurt so much that tears even pricked my eyes. I felt miserable for no reason, but Lee Juwon, who was carefully passed out beside me, comforted me. Right. Even in misery, you have to feel miserable while looking at the right person. I kept my mouth firmly shut and watched for any signs, worried even my groaning might be irritating.
“There won’t be a third time.”
“Yes.”
Perhaps pleased with my state, Lee Hyeonseok gave me a kind warning in a rather gentle voice. I now knew that those words were the truth. Lee Hyeonseok was a practical person who knew how to put his words into action. I answered quickly without much else to say. Lee Hyeonseok knelt down as if I’d done well and patted my head. They say crazy bastards’ thoughts can’t be understood by normal people.
“Next time you try to run away from me again, know that your ankle will be gone.”
“…Yep.”
I was flustered by his completely unpredictable actions, and this time my ankle was suddenly targeted out of nowhere. It seemed he really didn’t like me trying to run away. This time too, the answer was ‘yes or yes.’
“So, where were we in our conversation?”
“You were going to tell me something.”
“Ah. Right, that.”
Lee Hyeonseok, remembering what he was going to say, became serious. Even so, in my mind he could only be more than a crazy dog bastard who reads BL novels, never less, so I didn’t know what he was trying to excuse.
“It’s okay. As long as it’s interesting, whatever the genre…”
“I. Did. Not. Read. It.”
“Yes. Of course. That’s right. I’m just saying.”
Did my attempt to humor him properly step on a landmine? He spoke while breaking it down by syllables. Seeing his mood, which had barely eased, about to twist again, I agreed with his words in a very servile manner. Lee Hyeonseok still didn’t relax the intensity in his eyes, but he stood up as if willing to let it pass.
“Waaah!”
Then he grabbed me by the collar and forcibly stood me up. Startled, I was dragged toward him with a scream. This time too, he was arbitrary, not caring about my reaction at all.
“I have absolutely no interest in this dog-shit novel.”
In my 27 years of life, I’d never heard words so unconvincing. It would be more comfortable to just admit it. But if I said that, this time some part of my body would definitely say goodbye to me. I just nodded my head awkwardly instead of moving my mouth.
“Fuck.”
But somehow he too seemed quite aggrieved. At my lukewarm appearance, Lee Hyeonseok crumpled his face as much as possible, spat out a curse, then told me a shocking story.
“This novel was written by my blood relative.”
Blood relative? Lee Hyeonseok’s family?
“This, crazy fucking… I’m really embarrassed. That crazy bitch trying to fuck me over… Fuck. There was no bullshit like that.”
Perhaps my brain refused to accept the shocking story, as the content didn’t properly enter my head at all. I just blinked and stopped thinking. Conversely, Lee Hyeonseok’s face was fierce, as if recalling something that made his teeth grind. He seemed angrier than when he was mad at Lee Juwon. I thought that was now closer to hatred.
“That crazy fucking bitch. Just let me meet her. I’ll cut off her windpipe.”
Seeing him speak with such strong anger and hatred that tendons appeared on his jaw, it seemed to be true. So one of Lee Hyeonseok’s family members wrote this novel? And Lee Hyeonseok read that novel. Anyway, the conclusion was that he read it, wasn’t it?
“Hey.”
“Oh, yes!”
Lee Hyeonseok pulled me out of my shock. I didn’t know what other shocking thing he was calling me for this time. Now I was scared of the words that came out of that mouth. They say ignorance is bliss—the old saying wasn’t wrong about anything.
“Would someone normally try to fuck over their oppa by putting a character based on said oppa in a dog-shit novel?”
“Uh… Um…”
“And then self-publish that novel with their own money?”
“Hang in there…?”
Lee Hyeonseok recalled about a year ago. Even thinking about it again, it was something that wouldn’t be resolved without grinding her to drink. Unlike him, an illegitimate child, his younger sister was the legitimate wife’s child. It would normally mean their relationship wasn’t good, but that younger sister seemed to like him somehow and would happily follow him around whenever they met.
It was annoying, but not to the point of being unbearable to look at, so he left it alone. Then one day she came recommending some novel about men sucking each other off, saying it was interesting. The 17-year-old young bundle of blood, his younger sister, seemed to want to read her favorite novel and talk about it together, but fuck, this wasn’t it.
Lee Hyeonseok told his younger sister ‘Have you really gone crazy?’ and ‘Where do you get off shoving such a filthy novel at me,’ going through verses 1, 2, 3, and even repeating, grandly saying everything except double consonants. His younger sister screamed ‘I’ll get revenge!’
Then, not satisfied with writing a BL novel herself, she made a character modeled after him obsessed with the protagonist. And that’s not all? His sister widely showed her writing to those around her, self-published a physical book… Ah, she got beaten to death by their parents for that. Even though he didn’t read that damn novel, his sister persistently read her writing out loud in front of him. No. Even grinding her to drink wouldn’t be enough.
What made him think that crazy bitch was really crazy was something else. She described the protagonist’s appearance similar to herself. Not knowing that would all become his dark history.
Anyway, thanks to that, when he met the actual Lee Juwon, his sister strangely came to mind and he didn’t completely ignore him. When he recalled up to that point, the way he recklessly charged forward suddenly overlapped with his younger sister who had charged at him saying she’d get revenge. Come to think of it, the thought flashed that wasn’t it because of his sister that he ended up like this, and after that Lee Juwon was sprawled out. Moreover, this wasn’t even really his younger sister.
“Um, well, that is, I’m on hyung’s side…”
While Lee Hyeonseok was thoroughly chewing on his hatred, Seo Jiwoo awkwardly comforted Lee Hyeonseok. Somehow it was a deflating sight. Lee Hyeonseok scanned Seo Jiwoo up and down several times. He looked pale and scrawny. He was so laughable and insignificant that a snort came out without realizing.
“That’s, too much.”
Lee Hyeonseok raged on his own for quite a while. Certainly, if it were me, it was something that might raise my blood pressure enough to kill me. I felt truly sorry and sincerely comforted him, but what came back was a snort. My mouth finally moved on its own. Honestly, this time Lee Hyeonseok was harsh, but shouldn’t he let it slide?
“Again.”
“Your younger sister.”
But Lee Hyeonseok acted as if asking where I was crawling up from, and I humored him. But I wondered if Lee Hyeonseok even knew. If for Lee Hyeonseok, his younger sister was someone whose windpipe he wanted to cut, how much would Lee Hyeonseok, the blood relative who was the cause of it all, be someone I’d want to grind to drink and it still wouldn’t be enough? I wanted to return to Lee Hyeonseok the exact feelings he had for his sister.
“You don’t know anything.”
“Yesss…”
Lee Hyeonseok, who had been acting as he pleased for a while, asked again if I knew nothing. It might not be easy to believe, but no matter how many times he asked, not knowing was not knowing. However, as I said I didn’t know until the end, he too seemed to gradually give up. Fortunately. Like this, we could just pretend not to know each other—Lee Hyeonseok could live Han Hyeonseok’s life, and Seo Jiwoo could live Kim Hyeonmin’s life. What else could we do, when we didn’t know a way back?
If that was the case, I wanted to live an ordinary and peaceful life. To do that, I couldn’t get entangled with Han Hyeonseok. Han Hyeonseok was a main character in this novel, and Han Hyeonseok’s life had a ‘messy love affairs drama where everyone lives together’ reserved for the finale.
Of course, since Lee Hyeonseok possessed Han Hyeonseok, there was a high possibility of getting off that messy love affairs train, but Lee Hyeonseok’s character was rotten. No matter how much Lee Hyeonseok was someone who had wealth and power and even knew the future—fuck, someone who could monopolize everything by himself—I didn’t want to get entangled. A commoner had to live as a commoner.
“You’re not helpful.”
“That’s right.”
Lee Hyeonseok frowned, seemingly annoyed at this situation where he gained nothing. Even though it wasn’t my fault that I didn’t know, he meaninglessly criticized innocent me while looking me over. He seemed to be judging in his own way any possibilities or whether I was lying, but there was no further interrogation. It seemed he finally realized I wasn’t helpful. I very happily acknowledged his rude words. Let’s now return to being strangers to each other and live our own lives.
“Hmm…”
I was happy thinking about parting, whether he’d send me away or leave himself. But Lee Hyeonseok didn’t seem to have any intention of sending me away or leaving himself. Far from it, he looked like he was gauging whether to kill me or let me live, and I was once again seized by an ominous feeling.
“Um, huh? Agh! Ah!”
Lee Hyeonseok, who seemed to have been contemplating how to deal with me for a while, roughly grabbed my face with his large hand. Barely surprised by the suddenly approaching hand, a startled scream burst out involuntarily from the pain I felt to the point my cheeks stung. Actually, it didn’t hurt that much, but I deliberately exaggerated.
Lee Hyeonseok held my cheeks and turned them alternately to the right and left, observing. I didn’t understand what he wanted to do, but I quietly kept my mouth shut and let him do as he pleased for now.
“I’ll have to think about this gradually.”
