“My hyung asked me to bring one of his textbooks.”
A light ivory knit stood out among the dark brown uniforms.
Since there was such a large crowd, the boy’s face couldn’t be seen well, but to Kim Jaewook, it was a familiar build and voice.
“How cute! He came to run an errand for his hyung!”
“Huh? If it’s his hyung, then he’s a student here, right? Then he could just tell his hyung to get it himself.”
To this, the boy spoke in a somewhat gloomy tone.
“My hyung is sick and couldn’t come to school.”
“Sick? Who is it? Today’s absent student is…… Huh!”
“Don’t tell me your hyung is…….”
When everyone thought of the same face,
The boy drove the nail in.
“Yes. Third-year Baek Gunho is my hyung.”
“……!”
After a brief silence.
Everyone nodded as if they understood.
“Wow, no wonder.”
“Definitely, with that face.”
Surprisingly beautiful appearance, pretty yet with a strong impression!
Even if their features didn’t resemble each other, the soft expression contrasting with the sharp eyes was exactly like student council president Baek Gunho, like two peas in a pod.
“Should I show you the way? The president’s class happens to be three classes away from mine!”
“Hey, then it makes more sense for me to go since I’m in the class right next door! What’s your name?”
“Should noona buy you some snacks on the way?”
While students gathered in groups of threes and fives out of curiosity, only Kim Jaewook stood far apart.
Kim Jaewook, who had frozen in place at the unexpected face’s appearance, opened his phone screen again first.
Then he typed new content instead of the message he was originally going to write.
[Me: Hey did you send your little brother on an errand?]
[Gunho: ?]
The guy who usually replied every other day immediately sent an answer as soon as the word ‘little brother’ appeared.
Kim Jaewook was choked up, but now wasn’t the time to scold him.
[Me: He’s at our school right now]
Kim Jaewook waited a moment for a reply, but even after a while, the phone remained quiet.
‘Don’t tell me. Is this bastard on his way here?’
Kim Jaewook scratched his head furiously, recalling their elementary school days. He’s definitely suffering from motion sickness-like symptoms even now.
“Ah, whatever. I don’t know.”
Only after taking his eyes off the phone screen did he realize Baek Seolheon was standing right in front of him.
“Jaewook hyung. Hello.”
“……Oh! Oh yeah, you came to find Gunho’s book?”
Kim Jaewook calmed his startled heart and subtly took half a step back.
He had encountered Baek Seolheon a few times. Having been friends with Baek Gunho for years, he couldn’t not know the ‘little brother’ that guy always had on his lips.
A kind, gentle, smart child, exactly like Baek Gunho’s little brother should be.
Nevertheless, Kim Jaewook didn’t quite like Baek Seolheon.
He didn’t know the exact reason himself. Every time he mulled over why, no suitable explanation came to mind.
“Thank you for taking care of hyung yesterday.”
“No, if a friend collapses, of course you should…….”
“I’m glad Jaewook hyung is our hyung’s close friend.”
As if completely unaware of Kim Jaewook’s inner thoughts, Baek Seolheon smiled brightly, the corners of his eyes crinkling.
Then he whispered quietly enough that other students couldn’t hear.
“Thank you for always keeping the secret about hyung’s constitution.”
The childlike laughter that followed those words tickled his ear.
Kim Jaewook narrowed his brow.
The reason he didn’t like Baek Seolheon.
He didn’t realize it when he was young, but now he could clearly pinpoint just one thing.
A sense of incongruity.
Like a child wearing an adult’s suit, like an adult wearing a school uniform…….
An unfamiliar sensation as if wearing something that didn’t fit.
Even that smile seemed to float on top of his expression like a mask that could be put on and taken off.
“Please continue to take good care of our hyung.”
“……Yeah. But did Gunho really ask you to bring the book? Then I’ll just.”
“No.”
Baek Seolheon cut off Kim Jaewook’s words and moved his steps.
“I want to go get it myself.”
Just as he passed by on the right, Kim Jaewook saw it.
The innocent smile that had been on the boy’s face disappearing without a trace.
* * *
Baek Seolheon hugged a single textbook tightly to his chest and smiled.
“Hyung, noona. Thank you. Thanks to you, I found the textbook hyung mentioned right away.”
“Wow, Gunho is really amazing too. Trying to study even when he’s sick.”
“Would someone who’s at the top of the whole school think the same way as us?”
Before they knew it, students had gathered in Gunho’s class, dying to talk to Baek Gunho’s little brother.
“Do you need anything else?”
“I’m fine now. Thank you for buying me juice too.”
“You’re so good!”
Everyone kept repeating ‘cute,’ ‘so good,’ ‘as expected of the president’s brother,’ then lifted their heads at the school bell.
“Ah! Break time is over.”
“Then I’ll be going.”
“That’s too bad. I was curious about what you do at the president’s house.”
“Tell Gunho to get better soon!”
As the students scattered to their respective classes, Baek Seolheon also moved his steps.
The soft expression he had shown in front of the middle schoolers earlier was nowhere to be found, and he had already returned to an ice-cold expressionless face.
“……Hyung was right. Smiling is comfortable.”
Even at the elementary school Baek Seolheon attended, he often caused needless misunderstandings because of his cold impression.
But after listening to his hyung’s advice, such incidents clearly decreased.
‘Seolheon-ah. What you’re saying isn’t wrong. But people can get hurt even by correct words.’
For a moment, he recalled his hyung’s face as he admonished him.
‘Hyung will help you make up with your friend. So first, apologize with a smiling face. Everyone likes a smiling face.’
The voice was stern, but the warmth felt from the two hands placed on his shoulders was warm.
So Baek Seolheon couldn’t help but smile.
Whether others liked his smile or not wasn’t Baek Seolheon’s concern.
“…….”
He stopped walking briefly in the middle of the now-quiet hallway.
He closed his eyes then opened them, lightly caught his breath, and walked forward again.
“Where could it be…….”
Then an unpleasant ‘smell’ and ‘color’ began to distort his vision.
Red, blue, cold light, hot light.
An area that someone of that age, an immature child who hadn’t even undergone manifestation, could never perceive covered the world with various colors and patterns.
Like paint spreading in water, the colors spread, mixed, and undulated.
Baek Seolheon scanned the waves with his eyes and hurried his steps without hesitation.
‘No.’
Clumps of color gathering and scattering like smoke.
The boy’s footsteps had not a shred of hesitation.
‘This isn’t it either.’
Leaving the building, the moment he reached the elevated connecting passageway leading to another building……
Finally, one color caught in his vision.
“……Found it.”
The most unpleasant color that made him step foot here.
Grabbing the collar of a student connected to that color,
“Hello?”
Baek Seolheon smiled.
The male student, caught without understanding why, flinched in surprise and hunched his shoulders.
“Wh-who are you……?”
“Where are you going?”
Baek Seolheon asked questions while smiling throughout, as if the male student’s reaction didn’t matter at all.
The male student trembled and his lips quivered.
“I-I’m going to the music room because of class…….”
“Baek Gunho.”
Then he flinched greatly.
“As soon as I said that name, you suddenly turned around, didn’t you?”
“……!”
“Like you were running away.”
“N-no! What are you talking……!”
“That thing you’re hiding inside. It’s our hyung’s medicine, isn’t it?”
At Baek Seolheon’s interrogation, the male student reflexively pushed his hand deeper into his uniform jacket.
“Are you going to hide it somewhere else? Or throw it away?”
It hit the mark.
The male student was just about to put the medicine bottle hidden in his bag somewhere no one would know.
Originally, he had planned to return the medicine to Baek Gunho today and apologize, but…… he had no idea he would be absent. That he’d be in such critical condition, even more so…….
The male student wanted to immediately shake off the arm grabbing him and pour out excuses, but his body was frozen and wouldn’t move.
“Will it be okay?”
A situation where an elementary school student much younger than himself was sharply interrogating him.
The smile spread across those lips had no trace of mirth whatsoever.
“That’s expensive. Very.”
A warmly melting expression and lovely tone.
Contrasting with that, navy blue eyes where darkness had settled.
This contradiction felt eerie.
“N-no……! Th-this is just.”
“Yes. Just?”
Baek Seolheon nodded as if he would listen and waited.
Crushed by inexplicable pressure, the male student reflexively shouted loudly.
“I-it’s a suppressor! An omega pheromone suppressor!”
“Is that so?”
“Su-suddenly talking nonsense! This was mine from the beginning! I didn’t steal it!”
When he shook his arm off forcefully, the young boy’s body swayed greatly.
However, Baek Seolheon showed not a trace of surprise and merely crinkled the corners of his eyes slightly.
“Then what about hyung’s name?”
“N-name? Why do you need my name…….”
“You have the exact same medicine our hyung takes.”
Baek Seolheon pointed at the male student’s right hand.
The brown medicine bottle that slipped out from inside the uniform glinted in the sunlight.
On the bottle was a handwritten English label.
“An unlaunched trial drug from Baekil Pharmaceuticals that only a very small number of researchers participated in.”
“Ba-Baekil……Pharmaceuticals?”
The male student’s face turned deathly pale in an instant.
Baekil Pharmaceuticals.
The nation’s largest pharmaceutical company and a first-class pharmaceutical corporation boasting global prestige.
A trial drug under research there? What’s more shocking was…….
‘Gunho, aren’t you a chaebol golden spoon?’
‘Haha. Instead of bringing such rumors, hurry up and do your English homework.’
Baekil Group, the parent company of that Baekil Pharmaceuticals.
There was a time when rumors were rampant that Baek Gunho was a member of that very Baekil Group.
But the person in question usually brushed it off vaguely, so the rumors ended as baseless gossip.
“So I’m going to ask mom. Whether that person’s name is on the test subject list.”
At Baek Seolheon’s following words, the male student instinctively realized that rumor wasn’t just simple gossip.
“It probably won’t be there anyway.”
