It seemed to have been a passing shower, as the rain stopped quickly. Nevertheless, the fact that their clothes were wet remained unchanged. The two carefully descended the damp mountain path. Yoonjo hugged his body, which was starting to feel a bit chilly, and asked Seonwoo, who was walking ahead of him.
“Hyung, weren’t you scared inside that building earlier? Ghosts come out, and it had such a creepy feeling.”
“People are scarier than ghosts.”
“That’s true. Grandpa said that ghosts can’t harm the living. But people go around wielding knives….”
At the word “knife,” Seonwoo flinched for a moment, then walked on as if nothing had happened. Yoonjo wore a puzzled expression at the fleeting change Seonwoo showed and continued speaking.
“That barn back there actually belongs to the Somong Barn grandfather we saw earlier. He originally raised them modestly in the mountains, but the number of livestock increased, so he had no choice but to move them. Ah, that grandfather is really rich. They say this entire mountain is his property—isn’t that amazing? Anyway, it’s so cold because of the rain…. Hyung, where are we going later? You said we were going somewhere earlier.”
“I said it’s a good place. If you wait, I’ll escort you there nicely. Don’t rush me, Ji Yoonjo-ssi.”
“I really can’t stand not knowing….”
Seonwoo was listening pleasantly to Yoonjo’s chattering voice from behind when he suddenly realized something. It didn’t hurt. Whenever it rained, without fail, he would develop a fever and nightmares would crawl up endlessly. In fact, hadn’t he been sick just a few days ago? If there was a difference between now and then, it was Yoonjo’s presence. Seonwoo walked with Yoonjo, feeling the accumulating changes were unfamiliar.
When Yoonjo came down from the mountain and saw the car, he rushed over to it. He was shivering with cold and desperately needed the heater. Yoonjo, who had been stamping his feet by the driver’s side door, saw Seonwoo tap his waist and gesture with his head to go to the passenger side, which made his mouth pop open about three inches, but he soon obediently complied.
As soon as he sat in the passenger seat, warm heater air began to flow out. At first, his body shivered because it was cold, but before long, the inside of the car heated up warmly.
Yoonjo fastened his seatbelt and leaned back into the car seat as if burying himself in it, blinking his eyes slowly. He felt strangely languid and strangely drowsy. Looking at the time, it was only around 7 o’clock. It wasn’t even time to sleep, but he was strangely sleepy, so as he kept his eyes wide open, Seonwoo, who was starting the engine, said quietly as if tossing out the words.
“If you’re sleepy, sleep.”
“Hyung. You’re treating me like a little child from some new world. I’m not sleepy at all! I’m someone who stayed up all night studying every day when I was in high school, you know? My stamina from farming is top-notch, that’s what I’m saying. Just from walking around a bit.”
Yoonjo, who had spoken boldly, slapped both hands against his cheeks—smack, smack!—then looked ahead as if nothing was wrong. But that was only for a moment. Exactly three minutes later, Yoonjo began to fall asleep, using the sound of the heater as a lullaby and the car seat as a bed. He tried hard not to fall asleep by continuously headbanging, but gradually his eyes closed. Eventually, he dropped his head forward and began to sleep, making breathing sounds.
Seonwoo slowly pulled the car over to the side of the road, slowly tilted Yoonjo’s forehead back to lean against the seat, and reclined the car seat as far as it would go. He took out the black long cardigan he always carried with him from the back seat, covered Yoonjo with it, then tidied up his slightly disheveled hair. Even then, Yoonjo continued to breathe with those sounds.
“…They say kids make those breathing sounds even when they sleep.”
It was really a childlike breathing sound to be called snoring. Seonwoo sat in the driver’s seat, looked at Yoonjo’s sleeping face for a moment, then started the car again. Since he had said midnight, he thought there would be at least time for Yoonjo to sleep, and gently pressed the accelerator.
***
Startled by a “kreup” sound, Yoonjo drowsily opened his eyes. His back felt strangely uncomfortable. After tossing and turning several times, Yoonjo tried to pull up what he was holding in his hand to cover himself properly with the blanket, but he stopped short. It was because his view was too bright.
The stars densely embedded in the sky were visible far too clearly. He thought that couldn’t be right. Yoonjo’s room had only one window, and even that was on the small side, so unless it was broad daylight, sunlight didn’t fully pour in.
Blinking slowly to assess the situation, Yoonjo bolted upright. He had pounded his chest and acted like a manly man saying he wouldn’t sleep, but reality was quite different from what he knew. He unknowingly felt around his mouth with his palm, but fortunately, it didn’t seem like anything had drooled out.
Just as he reached out to get outside, someone knocked on the window. When he looked up, he saw Seonwoo. To be precise, it was a person’s silhouette, but he instinctively recognized it as Seonwoo. As he opened the door and stretched out his body that had been all crumpled up, a familiar voice was heard.
“You were sleeping so well that I didn’t wake you. But you woke up at the perfect timing.”
“Hyuuung…. Next time if I’m sleeping, please wake me up. I snore really badly and I grind my teeth and stuff, you know? I don’t want to show that kind of appearance in front of you, hyung….”
In reality, Yoonjo didn’t grind his teeth or snore, but sometimes when a person’s sleeping place changes, they do things they don’t normally do. Yoonjo didn’t want to show an unsightly appearance in front of the actor he liked, so he deliberately made up things that weren’t true and chattered on.
At those words, Seonwoo recalled Yoonjo’s breathing sounds and chuckled.
“I’m not sure about snoring or teeth grinding…. But your breathing sounds were a bit unique. Making those breathing sounds, like a baby.”
“Wow… This hyung really keeps bragging about being older. I wasn’t born yesterday, and I wasn’t born the day before yesterday either—I was born twenty years ago, you know?”
He didn’t respond, but Yoonjo thought Seonwoo was smiling. The corners of his mouth subtly visible under the brightly shining moonlight were proof of that. Yoonjo, who had been tapping the dirt ground with his foot, suddenly raised his head at hearing his name called.
“Yoonjo-ya.”
“Yes?”
“Look up.”
Perhaps because it was the countryside, or perhaps because they were on a mountain hill, the sky was exceptionally black. The stars within it, like white paint carelessly brushed on, appeared only vividly. It was the countryside sky he always saw. Not really any different.
Just as he opened his mouth, not knowing what exactly he was supposed to be looking at, as if on cue, something sparkled and passed by.
“…Huh?”
“There, another one’s passing by.”
A small star left a short tail and disappeared in an instant. It was a shooting star. From that moment on, Yoonjo looked at the sky with his eyes wide open. At that moment, another star passed by. Yoonjo quickly clasped his hands together, closed his eyes tightly, made a wish, then looked up at Seonwoo and asked.
“Did you make a wish? They say if you quickly say your wish three times when a star is passing by, it comes true.”
“…I’ll make one now.”
“Wow, this hyung really has no romance. No romance. When the star falls at exactly the right timing, you grab both hands tight! And quickly three times in your mind. Got it?”
Seonwoo, who said he understood with a laugh, looked up and waited for a star to fall. Yoonjo did too. But contrary to expectations, the next star didn’t fall right away.
Seonwoo, who had been looking up at the sky with his head raised for a while, couldn’t endure his stiffening shoulders and briefly looked away. Then Yoonjo quickly tapped Seonwoo’s shoulder lightly—pa-ba-bak—and made a fuss.
“Now, now!”
At that sound, Seonwoo unknowingly clasped both hands and closed his eyes. When he had muttered his wish in his mind exactly twice, Yoonjo asked.
“What did you wish for? Ah, right. These things don’t come true if you say them out loud. But maybe just a hint is okay? Something like winning the lottery? I’ll give you a hint too. Mine was a wish related to health.”
Seonwoo, who opened his eyes while saying his last wish, leaned down toward Yoonjo. Drawing close as if he might or might not touch his ear, he whispered very, very softly, barely audible.
“I asked for help to be able to cover it up.”
“Uh… what…. Is yours health too, hyung? Hyung, you’re too light. Even though I’m not particularly strong, seeing how I can lift you without any trouble, I think you might just be a sheet of paper….”
Yoonjo, who had been rambling, kept continuing to speak while fiddling with the ear that Seonwoo had touched. As a bonus, he had no awareness whatsoever of what he himself was saying right now.
His ear tickled. That ticklishness seemed to seep in along his skin, melting his nerve strings. Yoonjo, who had been pressing his earlobe firmly, suddenly felt that the body temperature touching his fingertips was abnormally high and lightly brushed his cheek with the back of his hand.
His entire face was hot.
The two people who had been outside for a while couldn’t withstand the mosquito attack and fled to the car. Fortunately, the mosquitoes that had been buzzing around their ears didn’t follow them inside the car.
“Hyung, how did you know the shooting stars were going to fall?”
Yoonjo kept rubbing his arms, which had gotten a bit chilly. Then, feeling warm air blowing, he moved his body forward a bit. Belatedly noticing that Seonwoo had turned on the heating, Yoonjo bowed his head.
“Thank you.”
Yoonjo, who brought both hands to where the heater air was coming out, tried to warm his body that had thoroughly cooled in the mountain air. Then a thin cardigan flew onto his lap. It was the cardigan Yoonjo had been sleeping under.
“Wear it.”
“What about you, hyung?”
“I’m fine, so wear it. And the shooting stars falling…”
As Seonwoo started the car and slowly turned the steering wheel, the small muscles of his forearm were briefly visible every now and then. Yoonjo glanced at Seonwoo’s arms, then looked at his own arms. No matter how he thought about it, even the shape of their muscles was different. Seonwoo’s muscles were prettily and attractively formed, but Yoonjo’s muscles were just clearly sturdy.
Damn, that’s so cool, even his muscles are pretty. What does one eat to become like that? Yoonjo kept stealing glances at Seonwoo.
“I found out while looking up information about the Space Science Center. Looking at the announcements, they said a meteor shower would fall at midnight today. They said it would be difficult to observe with the naked eye, so I was actually a bit worried, but fortunately we saw it well, right?”
Yoonjo, who fumbled to put on the fluffy cardigan, felt something like a strange perfume scent. It was a cool yet sweet, good scent whose identity he couldn’t pinpoint. What is this such a good scent…. Thinking it might be fabric softener, Yoonjo, who had been about to sniff it, quietly lowered his arms and nodded his head.
