Seowoo forced himself to ignore his burning face and said he had one more favor to ask. Hyeon gave a small nod — an attitude of go ahead, I’ll hear it — and Seowoo steadied his breath.
“I can’t collapse again. You saw Dano crying. I’m Dano’s dad, and so……”
I need to find a solution. The last words dissolved at the edge of his lips, barely audible — and perhaps because of that, the sincerity in them came through all the more clearly. Seowoo seemed to make up his mind, clenching both fists tightly as he looked Hyeon straight in the eye.
“I need an alpha. More precisely — pheromones. I need treatment, and I’d like you to help me with that.”
“……”
“Wh-while you’re staying here, I’d like you to share some pheromones with me.”
Hyeon stayed quiet and just listened, and it became harder and harder to keep speaking until Seowoo squeezed his eyes shut.
“The hospital said my body lost its regularity because of severe deprivation. They said if I could just regain the rhythm, I’d be able to regulate myself on my own…… and then I could return to a normal life.”
“A normal life where you don’t need an alpha?”
“Yes. I’ll make sure none of this causes any trouble or rumors for you.”
For Seowoo, those words had taken real courage to say. He’d put so much force into them that his fists wouldn’t even unclench properly. Fortunately, Hyeon didn’t press him. After waiting a long while — long enough for Seowoo to breathe comfortably again — Hyeon finally spoke.
“You said you had an alpha partner.”
“That was——!”
He knew it had been a lie all along, and yet he brought it up now. Hyeon looked like a man who had been waiting for exactly this moment. Seowoo judged that he could only receive help if he told Hyeon the truth.
“The one waiting in the parking lot that day was Donghyeok. He’s a beta.”
“So you lied.”
Seowoo fell briefly silent at his words, then answered. Admitting even a small lie with his own mouth was considerably uncomfortable.
“Yes. I was too startled at the time, and I lied because I felt pressured by you pushing so persistently.”
“So you’re saying you really don’t have a partner.”
He seemed to want to clearly sort out the full context now that he was the one being asked for a favor. Seowoo nodded firmly. After all, if he did have a partner, sharing pheromones wouldn’t be something Hyeon could do — he understood Hyeon’s position in wanting to establish that clearly.
“Let’s say Ji Donghyeok is a beta. That doctor you seemed quite close with is an alpha, and isn’t your business partner also an alpha? With all those close people around you, why does it have to be me specifically? It rather seems like ‘alpha pheromones’ are scattered all around Yoon Seowoo.”
“Those people…… won’t do.”
“Why. I don’t quite understand. Why it has to be me.”
Hyeon smiled mischievously at Seowoo, who had been rendered speechless.
“If I share my pheromones with you — what will you do for me?”
“……There’s nothing I can do for you, but.”
“Nothing, but?”
“Un-until you finish the series…… I’ll assist you wholeheartedly. It’d be better for you too if I’m healthy.”
“Hmm.”
He tossed the entire pack of cigarettes he’d been holding straight into the trash. Then he took two steps forward and came to stand right in front of Seowoo.
“The baby doesn’t like me, you know. Will that be okay?”
It was a question, but it was close to an affirmative answer. Seowoo felt as though his back was soaked through with cold sweat.
“Once you get closer…… Dano is good-natured and gentle, so it’ll be fine quickly. If you buy snacks together and spend time like that……”
Hmm. Hyeon let out a low hum in his throat. Watching Seowoo’s wide-open eyes, he stepped one step closer. Seowoo couldn’t do anything but feel the measuring gaze on him. He could only hope that Hyeon — a man who never did things he didn’t want to do — wouldn’t simply up and leave. As long as he had to look after Dano, all the complicated things from the past had become secondary concerns.
When Hyeon’s arm suddenly swept upward, Seowoo flinched involuntarily and closed his eyes. Hyeon’s pheromones gave Seowoo two sensations: comfort, and an unbearably intense arousal. So it was only natural that he tensed at even a single gesture like this.
But Hyeon silently pulled Seowoo into a sudden, tight embrace. The moment he was enveloped in that warm hold, the scent poured over him like rushing water, wrapping around his entire body.
His muscles melted and went limp, as though submerged in hot water. His lower abdomen clenched with tension, and at the same time a languid, tickling warmth bloomed through him. Just as Seowoo was about to instinctively wrap his arms around Hyeon’s torso in return, Hyeon whispered in a low voice.
“I don’t like lies.”
“……I understand.”
Seowoo had been about to hold him back but stopped, curling both hands into fists in the empty air instead.
“So you’ll help me, then?”
It seems like things are working out better than expected. He felt a little dazed.
“But isn’t Yoon Seowoo talking about a pheromone shower a little too casually? In broad daylight, on a street like this.”
“You were thinking about that?”
Seowoo asked back, his head going hot. The primitive solution that second-trait carriers often heard when they went to the hospital for pheromone disorders. Setting aside that Hyeon even knew about it — what shocked Seowoo more was the fact that Hyeon had interpreted his request that way and still hadn’t pushed him away.
Seowoo looked up at Hyeon. Did he really think it meant a pheromone shower?
“I said that much wouldn’t be necessary.”
“Isn’t the easiest and fastest way the se—”
Hyeon was about to drop the word so casually from those beautifully sculpted lips. If Seowoo hadn’t instinctively covered his mouth, he would have said it to the end.
“No. I’m already better than yesterday, aren’t I. If anything, something as…… intense as yesterday is too much for me.”
As Seowoo stumbled over the words in protest, Hyeon let out a low, amused laugh. Beneath Seowoo’s palm, he could feel the corners of Hyeon’s mouth curling up. Hyeon watched with what seemed like amusement as Seowoo flinched and squirmed, yet held his hand in place and kept it there.
“Is that so? That’s a little anticlimactic.”
“Did you like that sort of thing?”
Seowoo shot back with unmistakable disbelief this time, and Hyeon laughed again.
“No way. I don’t.”
Hyeon looked down at Seowoo with an expression that said, and what about you?
“I-I don’t either.”
The soft pheromones suddenly grew denser in an instant. Seowoo felt the arms wrapped around him stiffen, and his body shuddered. The tips of Hyeon’s lips brushed against his fingers.
“Going feral on pheromones, rutting like animals……”
This time, Hyeon reached out and pressed down gently on Seowoo’s lower lip. Since Seowoo had touched first, he couldn’t turn his head away — he had no choice but to give his lips over to that touch as it was. Seowoo stopped breathing and couldn’t even blink. Savoring the gaze fixed on him, Hyeon continued slowly.
“That’s not something I enjoy.”
* * *
Since reuniting with Hyeon in front of the hospital, their bodies had made contact three times total.
Two of those times, Seowoo had fainted. The third and last time, he had stayed conscious. Had his body, which had been so overwhelmed by the sudden flood of Hyeon’s pheromones, begun to change little by little? Either way, managing to keep a clear head was a good sign.
The unsettling feeling he sensed in Hyeon’s words and expressions — he filed that away under his sensitive personality and deliberately buried it. On the way home, Dano had cried refusing to get in Hyeon’s car, and there hadn’t been any room to dwell on it more deeply.
Come to think of it, the fact that Hyeon had agreed to help at all was remarkable. Assuming that what he’d said about coming here for a vacation was true. Even if that vacation had been sparked by curiosity toward Seowoo, whom he’d reunited with after three years. Normally, most people wouldn’t readily step forward for something as heavy as treatment. It came with a weight of responsibility they didn’t need to take on, and it was burdensome.
Not telling Hyeon during the pregnancy had been Seowoo’s own choice, so this request for treatment was undeniably a selfish one. Even if Hyeon didn’t know…… The fact that he hadn’t revealed the full truth and had told a selective lie about needing alpha pheromones made him feel terribly shameless. But it was also clear that he’d had no other options.
“If he ever finds out everything, what would he do……”
‘Going feral on pheromones, rutting like animals — that’s not something I enjoy.’ Those words must have been referring to the cycle three years ago. Seowoo had kept that night wrapped in a warm haze of memories, and from it had even gained precious Dano. But to Hyeon — it was nothing more than a night swept up in pheromones. Nothing more, nothing less.
Seowoo helped Dano assemble his toys, thinking about Hyeon the entire time. Perhaps because they had talked things through about the treatment and his mind was finally at ease — he had slept deeply for the first time in a long while the night before. Even with guilt tangling his thoughts in a complicated knot, he had passed out without even dreaming. Separate from the refreshed feeling, it was almost absurd to him.
It was a weekend morning, so there was no daycare for Dano — after washing him up and feeding him, Seowoo had just been thinking about asking Hyeon about his schedule for the day. There were no set days off for their photography arrangement, just as there were none for the shop. Though the weather outside the window was looking extremely grim. It wasn’t just the disappearance of the sunlight leaving everything dark — the sound of the wind rattling the windows was unsettling too.
Was there a typhoon forecast? He was about to look up the news when Donghyeok opened the door and came in, telling him that Hyeon had left.
