# Chapter 112
Mo Eunje looked up from his restrained wrist. He didn’t avoid the vivid eyes that seemed to see through everything. He had no intention whatsoever of voicing the confusion he’d felt that summer when he was eighteen. He now knew that even one wrong word could subject Tae Igyeol to unavoidable false hope. The foolish and stupid things he’d done in the past were already more than enough.
“…Yeah. Not for a single moment have I liked you differently.”
“You’re lying.”
“I really haven’t. You’ve been my friend from the beginning until now, and you’ll continue to be my friend until we die. I like you as a friend. I don’t have any other feelings.”
“…”
Mo Eunje firmly rejected him in a calm tone. Things might be awkward when they saw each other for a while, but this was an inevitable process since Tae Igyeol had confessed.
So why did he have to confess…
Instead of a reproachful complaint, he twisted his restrained wrist. Continuing this conversation would only result in repeating the same words.
“Let go. It hurts.”
Tae Igyeol’s hand fell away limply. The restrained wrist throbbed with pain. While Mo Eunje was rubbing his wrist with his opposite hand, Tae Igyeol stood up.
“Fine. Let’s get some sleep for now. Since you’d sleep better without me around, I’ll stay at a hotel tonight.”
“Stop it already. This is your house, and you’re going around with an injured arm saying you’ll leave again and again. I’ll go out, so take your medicine and sleep comfortably in bed. You don’t look good.”
“Eunje-ya.”
“Don’t call me. Don’t hold me back, and don’t think about leaving. If you do, I… really won’t see you anymore.”
Mo Eunje made a threat that would surely work on Tae Igyeol, then grabbed only his phone and wallet and headed for the entrance. Even knowing that Tae Igyeol was watching with a dazed expression, Mo Eunje kept his face hardened and didn’t give him a single glance.
“Contact me when you’ve cooled down and sorted out your feelings. Until you sort out your feelings, I think it’s better if we don’t see each other.”
“It’s too late. This isn’t the kind of feeling I can sort out just because I want to.”
Mo Eunje had effectively opened one last breakthrough to preserve their relationship, but Tae Igyeol blocked even that breakthrough by prioritizing his clear emotions.
Mo Eunje tried to reassure himself that Tae Igyeol was acting this way because he couldn’t think rationally right after confessing, and opened the front door. In reality, it was just another escape.
Even after leaving the villa building, he couldn’t decide where to go. The dawn, when everyone had closed their eyes, was chillingly quiet. Knowing that Tae Igyeol was surely watching from the window, he started walking aimlessly to escape from his view.
At such a late hour, it seemed better for him to leave rather than send Tae Igyeol out and spend the night worrying restlessly. Even if that weren’t the case, if one person had to leave, anyone would agree it should be him.
“Haah… what am I supposed to do…”
A storm had suddenly swept into his peaceful life, bringing unusual difficulties and harsh trials. He didn’t want to hurt Tae Igyeol, but he felt his heart crumble knowing that no matter what he did, it would hurt him. At that moment, ironically, the Tarot Master’s voice came clearly to mind.
‘This is a problem that the customer cannot control. Whether you worry or not, it’s something that will definitely happen, as if it were destined from a past life.’
It felt like being forced to submit to fate. Now that Tae Igyeol had voiced his feelings, they couldn’t return to their previous relationship. But no matter how much Mo Eunje struggled, he wondered if perhaps their relationship was destined to change inevitably. Having had such feelings himself in the past, it seemed that even if they’d delayed it, this was something they would have experienced at least once in this lifetime.
&&
Tae Igyeol, who had been staring at the front door through which Mo Eunje had left with a blank expression, collapsed onto the sofa as the tension left his body. His emotions told him not to let Mo Eunje leave like this, to go after him and stop him, but his reason prevented him from moving, saying that Mo Eunje also needed time to think alone. Tae Igyeol had harbored these feelings, which he believed without doubt to be love, for over 10 years, but Mo Eunje had given up his first love and treated it as mere friendship, so he would need time to accept it.
So many things had happened in just a few minutes. It felt so unreal that he wondered if he was dreaming. Then suddenly, checking the time, he came to his senses and called Ban Hajun.
“What if I’m with my lover when you call so suddenly in the middle of the night?”
“You said you were dumped because you had an affair with your boss.”
“Can you just say we broke up normally? And even if we’re best friends, you should first message to ask if I can take a call at this hour—”
“Who’s best friends with whom?”
“If you don’t consider Eunje as your friend, then it’s you and me who are best friends. Who else would it be?”
Excluding Mo Eunje, the only people Tae Igyeol could call friends were Ban Hajun, Gye Minho, and Shin Dael. But Shin Dael was a case of becoming close in a short time for special reasons, and in six years, he had never met Gye Minho alone. From the beginning, Mo Eunje had always been with them whenever Gye Minho was around. Moreover, it was true that he often opened up to and spent time with Ban Hajun, so he had nothing to refute. Even when the four of them hung out together, depending on personalities, some people naturally became closer than others.
“Don’t attach childish words to it. Take Mo Eunje with you.”
“What are you talking about, calling so suddenly in the middle of the night… Wait! Did you confess?”
“Mo Eunje left about 5 minutes ago. Call him before he goes somewhere weird.”
Since Mo Eunje knew a lot of people, there was a high chance he would go somewhere Tae Igyeol didn’t know. That would be a disaster. Before that happened, he needed to make sure Mo Eunje stayed within his reach. Even when he went to Busan alone, he had contacted Han Seola under the pretext of checking in, to monitor Mo Eunje’s condition. How relieved he had been to hear that Mo Eunje had just been sleeping the whole time.
“Wow… what’s happening in the middle of the night? I didn’t think you’d actually confess. I thought you’d only do it before your coffin closed.”
“Stop talking nonsense and take Mo Eunje with you. If he refuses, kidnap him if you have to.”
“What kidnapping? Are you trying to make me a criminal? Hang up. I’ll call Mo Eunje and then call you back.”
The call ended, and Tae Igyeol, who had thrown his phone aside, rubbed his face with his hands. Though he had suddenly kissed Mo Eunje, overall he had been progressing step by step, not rushing, following each stage carefully.
In the worst-case scenario where Mo Eunje continued to refuse, he had planned to mobilize even his grandmother for an extreme move. During his entire hospital stay, he had prepared 11 different plans depending on Mo Eunje’s reactions. Now he had implemented the first stage. Mobilizing his grandmother was the very last stage. If he had been a slightly more unethical and extreme person, the number of plans might have increased to 12 with the criminal method of confinement.
He didn’t expect the simple stages of “confession-acceptance-dating” that Ban Hajun had said was the easiest way to date. Still, he hoped that the dragging time would be shortened and many stages would be skipped in the process of Mo Eunje accepting his love. More than anything, he hoped that Mo Eunje wouldn’t avoid him. He was confident in enduring, persevering, and waiting, but not being able to see Mo Eunje’s face would be too painful.
But Mo Eunje chose to run away again, exactly as predicted without a margin of error. It was a bitter result, even though he had known it would happen. Still, it wasn’t completely without gain. Having seen the wavering in Mo Eunje’s eyes, Tae Igyeol had no choice but to push forward with conviction.
After just a few minutes, his phone rang. The caller was Ban Hajun. It was a call he had to answer no matter what, to confirm Mo Eunje’s whereabouts.
“Yeah.”
“I told him I’d order late-night food, so come over. But his voice sounded completely normal?”
“Did you think he’d make a fuss and show it after receiving a confession?”
“I didn’t expect that, but I thought he’d be out of his mind with shock. Showing that you like someone and confessing are different.”
Mo Eunje had been surprised, but not to the extent of being out of his mind with shock. And even then, he wasn’t shocked by the confession but by the kiss. When Tae Igyeol confessed… rather than being surprised, Mo Eunje had looked hurt, like someone who had heard words they shouldn’t have heard, even though they had suspected it. No, perhaps his expression had been one of resignation, as if he had finally accepted that what was bound to happen had happened, despite his desperate denial.
“He didn’t seem very surprised. I’ll send over some late-night food. Eat together.”
“Chicken feet in extremely spicy sauce set and super spicy tteokbokki set. Add steamed egg and flying fish roe rice balls.”
“Hey.”
“It’s not what I want to eat, it’s what Mo Eunje likes. I’m offering to eat with him instead of you, since he could never eat it with you even if you died. Don’t like that?”
“Hang up.”
Tae Igyeol unilaterally ended the call. Mo Eunje occasionally ate painfully spicy food with him too, and at those times, Tae Igyeol ordered non-spicy options like nurungji soup or fried food to eat together. They hadn’t eaten the same type of food, but they had still eaten together.
But rationalizing only made him feel miserable. With spicy food, he felt not taste but the painful abuse of his tongue and stomach. If possible, he wanted to eat together with Mo Eunje like Ban Hajun did, enjoying the foods Mo Eunje found delicious, and sharing that pleasure. But spicy taste is pain. There was no way Tae Igyeol could enjoy it.
Clearing away thoughts that would be difficult to fulfill in this lifetime, he accessed the delivery app. He changed the address to Ban Hajun’s officetel and selected the spiciness level that Mo Eunje liked—the hellish taste level—on the menu selection screen that Ban Hajun had requested. He ordered the chicken feet in sauce and spicy tteokbokki sets for delivery, then threw his phone back onto the sofa.
He had no idea whether his timing for the confession had been appropriate and acted as an opportunity, or if it had gone wrong and become a crisis. He had done all he could, so now everything depended on Mo Eunje.
“…”
He had the illusion that the soft sensation and heat still remained on his lips. He gently traced his own lips with his finger. They would be no different from usual, but having claimed Mo Eunje’s lips made him feel dizzy.
These lips had touched Mo Eunje’s lips. Not just touched, but overlapped, with their tongues, saliva, and breaths mingling. It was on a completely different level from the kiss Mo Eunje had given while under the influence of medication. After enduring, suppressing, bearing, and hiding his feelings every second of every moment with Mo Eunje, he had finally done it.
He didn’t regret it at all, but he felt he wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight.
