Chapter 9
“Hey, red light!”
Mo Eunje’s sudden shout jolted Tae Igyeol into action. His hand shot toward the passenger seat as he slammed the brakes. The car stopped safely behind the line, and Mo Eunje, still startled, fumbled for the hazard light button.
“You okay?” Tae Igyeol checked, relieved to see Mo Eunje was just shaken, not hurt.
“Where was your head? You missed the traffic light!”
“Ah. Sorry.”
“It’s not about being sorry. Did you not sleep well? You went to bed later than me last night and got up at dawn.”
Mo Eunje had crawled into bed at 4 AM and was up before sunrise, so his exhaustion was understandable. Tae Igyeol, on the other hand, had skipped the stock market today to catch up on sleep while Mo Eunje was out house-hunting with Song Yeonhwa. He wasn’t tired at all.
“Pull over. I’ll drive so you can nap.”
“We’re less than 10 minutes from the department store.”
“Then I’ll drive on the way back. I’m scared you’ll fall asleep at the wheel.”
“No, I’m fine. I just zoned out for a second. Sorry.”
Tae Igyeol couldn’t bring himself to doze off with Mo Eunje in the car. How could he risk falling asleep at the wheel with someone so precious beside him? That’s why, even though he was curious about which house Mo Eunje would choose, he had deliberately annoyed his mother to get kicked out and gone home to sleep for a few hours. He wanted to be fully alert to drive safely to the department store.
***
“I think I just lost a friend. And…”
“……”
“……I gained a boyfriend.”
“What?”
“Babe.”
“Fuck, you crazy bastard. Isn’t today April Fools’?”
***
When Mo Eunje—of all people—looked at him with affection and called him “babe,” Tae Igyeol’s heart nearly burst out of his chest. His defenses kicked in, and he cursed—even though he knew it was an April Fools’ joke, the world had felt like it stopped in that moment.
The shy tone, the loving expression, the earnest gaze, the breath that made him want to reach out—every detail was seared into his memory, replaying over and over against his will. No wonder he had been so distracted that he missed the traffic light changing. From his perspective, it was almost inevitable.
He should have been angry at the joke. But hearing Mo Eunje call him “babe,” even in jest, made him inexplicably happy. The thought of actually being in a relationship, of Mo Eunje calling him that for real, filled him with so much joy he could cry. It was just a fantasy with no chance of becoming reality, yet his happiness soared.
***
“Do you even know how dangerous it is to zone out while driving? You’re asking for trouble.”
“I said I was sorry…”
“It’s not about apologizing to me—I’m worried about you doing the same thing when you’re driving alone. What if you’re not paying attention to traffic lights or something?”
“I won’t.”
He had never zoned out while driving before. If Mo Eunje hadn’t smirked and called him “babe,” he would have been well-rested and fully focused on the road.
“Good. But you never know if you’ll get tired. You wake up early for stocks, so stop watching movies late at night and just go to bed. What’s so fun that you stay up until dawn?”
“I’ll handle it.”
“Yeah, yeah. Sure you will.”
The light turned green. Tae Igyeol gently pressed the accelerator and started driving again. “Babe” still echoed in his mind, but he forced himself to concentrate. He couldn’t risk putting Mo Eunje in danger again.
***
“Oh? Auntie sent me a family restaurant gift card. She said we worked hard looking at houses today and told us to eat this for dinner. She’s the best, right?”
Mo Eunje grinned as he checked his phone. His own mother had never sent him a coffee coupon, yet Song Yeonhwa often sent gift cards to Mo Eunje. He wasn’t jealous or upset—seeing Mo Eunje so happy made those feelings impossible.
“Wow, it’s a set with two steaks, a baguette, pasta, salad, and drinks. One steak per person. The steaks are different kinds, so wanna split them?”
“Sure.”
Tae Igyeol couldn’t help but smile faintly as he glanced at Mo Eunje, who was beaming so purely.
“Nice! Auntie also sent a castella coupon. There’s a new bakery around here, I guess. If you’d inherited even half of Auntie’s taste, you wouldn’t have been buying the same castella from the same bakery for years.”
“……Just eat it and shut up.”
“Eunje’s already pretty, but he gets even prettier when he eats well, right? I know. It is the best around here, though.”
“……”
“I should send Auntie a coffee coupon too. The café on the first floor of her company is Kangdabang, right?”
“Yeah.”
On the surface, their conversation was as ordinary as any other day. But Tae Igyeol was secretly waiting for an opening. If he had been good at calculating things like this, he wouldn’t have spent all these years pining in secret.
***
“But, uh… earlier, when my mom said we should actually date and get married, what would you have done?”
Tae Igyeol’s mind had already raced ahead—imagining dating Mo Eunje, marrying him, even going on a honeymoon—but he was clumsy at bringing up past conversations.
“Suddenly?”
“What’s sudden about it? You were joking about it the whole time we were eating.”
“No, I thought it was over when we said goodbye to Auntie.”
“So? What would you have done if my mom had actually told us to?”
“What do you mean, what? Auntie wouldn’t care, but you would’ve freaked out. Obviously.”
Tae Igyeol was afraid of revealing his feelings, afraid of losing even the friendship they had. He had spent years pretending to dislike, scorn, and resent—all to keep his place by Mo Eunje’s side. He couldn’t risk losing that.
At least today was April Fools’ Day, the one day of the year when he could hide behind the cliché of pranks.
“……What if I didn’t freak out?”
“You’re more uptight than Auntie, and you’re asking me that?”
“Didn’t I just say it? My type is you.”
“Yeah, babe. Love you. Let’s make today our one-day anniversary.”
“……”
The words he had longed to hear—his heart stopped, and his defenses failed. The world seemed to mute, his mind blanking. He knew it was meaningless, but he couldn’t breathe. A single careless, joking word from Mo Eunje, devoid of sincerity or soul, and yet it dominated his every thought and sense.
“Huuu……”
Only after forcing out a breath did he realize he had been holding it. As reality rushed back, his heart, which had seemed to stop, now pounded wildly on its own. His ears and the nape of his neck burned.
If Mo Eunje had said “I love you” with genuine feeling, with his heart and soul, Tae Igyeol would have died without regret. Maybe that was all he had ever wanted in the years he had stayed by Mo Eunje’s side. But if he actually received Mo Eunje’s love, he would be too afraid to let it go.
***
“I should send the cake with the set. I’ll tell Auntie to try ashatchu too. Hey, where are you going? You need to change lanes.”
“Ah……”
The department store parking lot required a lane change and a right turn to enter. But Tae Igyeol, lost in the replay of “I love you,” had driven straight. The navigation recalculated the route.
“You’re really off today.”
“What do you mean?”
“You keep zoning out, and you won’t even play along with April Fools’ jokes. They say when someone suddenly changes, it’s a sign they’re about to die…”
“You’re the one who started this joke.”
“Which makes it even weirder. Remember last April Fools’ when I showed up holding hands with Ban Hajun and said we were dating? You were ready to cut us off.”
How could he forget?
That was the day Ban Hajun found out about his hidden feelings. It was also the day he learned Ban Hajun didn’t care about gender when it came to dating. Ban Hajun was dating a girlfriend now, but the ex he broke up with last fall had been a guy.
“I really thought I was going to lose my best friend that day. But you and Gye Minho actually fell for it. How could you believe me and Ban Hajun? Ugh, the thought alone is horrifying.”
What if it wasn’t Ban Hajun, but me and Tae Igyeol? Ugh, the thought alone is horrifying.
Tae Igyeol’s ears twisted the name—Ban Hajun became Tae Igyeol. The idea of Mo Eunje thinking that way made his chest tighten and his breath catch. His grip on the steering wheel tightened, veins bulging on his hands and forearms.
