Just a moment ago, Siwon’s face, which had been wearing a leisurely smile at the thought of teasing Seongyeom, crumpled satisfyingly. Tsk. Clicking his tongue briefly, he grabbed Lee Seongyeom’s wrist in one swift motion.
“Uwah!”
Seongyeom, who thought he would fall, blinked his eyes while being held in Siwon’s solid embrace. In an instant, he’d become like a herbivore with its nape exposed. It was a moment when he felt the overwhelming difference in strength anew. The sense of helplessness was only fleeting. Soon after, subtle anticipation that Siwon’s hot breath and wet tongue would descend upon his skin swept through his entire body. Seongyeom raised his eyes, dampened with heat, to look up at him.
“…Kehek?!”
What touched the back of his neck wasn’t soft lips or explicit tongue play. The large hand covering the back of his neck gripped Seongyeom’s neck tightly as if grabbing a chicken’s neck. He could feel the pulsing veins at Siwon’s fingertips.
“P-President!?”
Seongyeom called out to Siwon in a flustered voice.
Is he angry because I told him to move?! I was just embarrassed!
Seongyeom became tearful and recalled what happened a few days ago. Back then too, he’d gone on about money out of embarrassment and heard the ruthless words “either leave the house or stay as a sex partner” (that’s how Seongyeom understood it). Instead of repeating the same mistake, Seongyeom chose to carefully place his hand over Siwon’s large hand to appease him.
“P-Presideent…. It, it’s not that….”
Having to act cute when he didn’t mean it was killing him. He dragged out his words to buy time to think. As Seongyeom groaned looking for a suitable excuse, Siwon stroked his back, where scabs hadn’t fallen off yet, with his thumb and said,
“You’ll have a big scar.”
“…What?”
He turned his head to look at Siwon. His expression as he turned his nape back and forth didn’t look good at all. Since it was an area that hadn’t been touched for a while, the feeling of Siwon’s touch was unfamiliar. Even though it had healed, the thinned skin swelled up sensitively right away. Seongyeom shrank his shoulders.
“Does it hurt?”
Siwon asked, quickly releasing the hand gripping his nape.
“No…. It doesn’t hurt….”
As he sat up, Siwon obediently stepped back and created distance. Seongyeom didn’t miss the momentary anxious look that crossed Siwon’s eyes.
Having been together for the past few days, Seongyeom had also learned something about Siwon.
Usually, he was a person who had no qualms about pressuring people, but the moment he showed signs of pain or difficulty, he would withdraw unusually easily. As if he himself felt that pain.
When the knee between his legs withdrew and he could stand up straight, Seongyeom looked up at Siwon suspiciously.
Why is he acting like this?
The momentum that had been pressing in as if to devour him just moments ago was gone, and the hand hovering around the wound was now overly cautious and persistent.
Seongyeom flexed his back muscles as his skin stung. He turned off the shower valve, stood in front of the mirror, and wiped the moisture-covered mirror. He could see Siwon stroking from his shoulder blade to his neckline with his long fingers with worried eyes.
“President….”
The wound had healed, they said. There would be a small scar, but on a man’s body, what’s a little scar? He was about to tell him it was okay, but the expression reflected in the mirror looked so pained.
“President.”
Seongyeom called Siwon again, but Siwon was still lost in his own thoughts and couldn’t hear Seongyeom’s voice. Seongyeom, who had been looking at him through the mirror, rolled his eyes.
…How embarrassing.
Seongyeom reluctantly turned to face Siwon.
“President!”
“…Yeah.”
When he raised his voice a bit to call out, the pitch-black eyes slowly regained their light. Seongyeom pouted his lips, feeling upset for no reason.
Just how ugly must the scar be for him to act like that? Daerim ahjussi said it healed well….
Seongyeom looked into the mirror again with an uncomfortable feeling. When he rubbed the mirror that had turned hazy with moisture once more with his palm, the outline became a bit clearer. He tried to reflect his shoulder and back by tilting his head this way and that, but the angle didn’t work well. He tilted his head and tried his best to check the scar by folding his left shoulder as much as possible.
What was reflected in the mirror was a long red mark drawn from his shoulder to his back. Although the flesh had healed, the trace where the sharp blade had dug in deep continued long like a child’s scribble. There were still parts with scabs remaining, and the surrounding skin was bumpy as if that part alone had been gouged out with a rough knife. Seongyeom unconsciously drew in a breath.
“…What is this.”
He raised his right hand and carefully felt his left shoulder. The scab swollen with water and an unfamiliar texture touched his fingertips. There was no clean skin like before. It wasn’t simply a “small scar.”
The traces of having gouged out the flesh torn open from the shoulder split by a sharp blade to the back, with marks of forcibly stitching it together, were nakedly carved in. It was a size that couldn’t be covered even by Siwon’s large hand. Seongyeom’s face twisted miserably.
“Why is this, why is it like this? Daerim ahjussi clearly said… he said it healed well… that it healed prettily….”
Seongyeom kept pulling at his shoulder and looking in the mirror as if he couldn’t believe it. Siwon silently watched Seongyeom before lowering his gaze. What Daerim said probably meant it healed well compared to the weapon he was attacked with.
The weapon Gold Tooth used to attack Lee Seongyeom wasn’t an ordinary knife. The curved blade was spread out in a bizarre form like a saw blade. He probably said that because it was fortunate that chunks of flesh hadn’t fallen off. There was no way Lee Seongyeom, an ordinary person, could understand what kind of knife had stabbed him or what kind of scar such a knife would leave.
Siwon didn’t know what words to use to comfort him and took a long time choosing his words.
“…I’ll have them look into a hospital that’s good at treating scars.”
The low-falling voice wasn’t smooth or playful like usual. It was a calm tone, as if he was serious, as if he really intended to do so.
Seongyeom turned to look at Siwon with hollow eyes, his skin reddened from repeatedly pulling at his shoulder. Siwon felt his mind go blank for a moment, captivated by Seongyeom’s disgusted look that he was seeing for the first time. Still, he tried his best not to slur his words and finish his lines.
“These days, scars can also….”
“It’s fine.”
“…What?”
“I guess all gangsters are like that. You say plausible things…. But when a situation actually happens, it’s completely different from what you heard.”
“……”
“I’ll go downstairs.”
I have to prepare breakfast for the hyungs. Lee Seongyeom, who quickly passed by him while grabbing a towel, was only cruel. Judging by his stiff tone drawing a line, was he going to take the money and quit?
“Ha.”
His eyes met his own reflection in the mirror. It was funny how soaking wet he looked, so he laughed.
Right, that’s the right response.
What was I expecting?
“…Damn it.”
Siwon swept back his wet hair. Below his wet pants, his center bulged prominently.
“Is that brat doing it on purpose, or is he unaware…. Ha.”
He let out deep sighs while pulling down his wet clothes that wouldn’t come off easily, but that was all. He couldn’t bring himself to grab Seongyeom again.
***
Seongyeom, with wet hair and just the moisture shaken off, firmly grasped his shoulder embedded with a large scar and rotated his arm to stretch. Fortunately, it was all covered by his t-shirt, but since it connected to his shoulder, the long scar mark kept catching his eye.
What will I say if Ms. Na finds out later? He went down the stairs with a sigh.
The living room sofa was bustling from early morning. Cheong and Seoldong were lying like corpses reading books, and three or four other organization members were watching the morning news.
“Cheong-ah. Choi Seoldong.”
At Seongyeom’s call, Yi Cheong and Seoldong in their school uniforms turned around with zombie-like sunken eyes, craning their necks.
“Uugh. Teacher. Why are you only coming down now…? My stomach skin is sticking to my back.”
“Sorry, sorry. I was washing up. Are you hungry?”
“I’m so hungry my head won’t work. Teacher. Starving a high school boy is a crime.”
“Oh my, such exaggeration. I’ll prepare it quickly.”
“Exaggeration? Did you just say exaggeration? Eek!”
Yi Cheong, who was reaching out angry hands toward Seongyeom, happened to make eye contact with Siwon coming down from upstairs.
“Kek.”
Yi Cheong quickly pretended to stretch and hid his head on Seoldong’s shoulder. Thanks to that, Seoldong’s face, which had been glaring at the social studies textbook as if to kill it, suddenly changed as brightly as a flower meeting spring. Seoldong grinned and looked down at Yi Cheong leaning on his shoulder.
“Cheong-ah, why?”
“Mmng? Ah. I, I don’t understand what this says. Explain it to me.”
“Ah, this….”
“……”
Siwon looked at Yi Cheong suspiciously. Wondering why he was hurriedly avoiding his gaze when he came. But soon, seeing him stuck next to Choi Seoldong looking at a book, he withdrew his suspicious gaze without saying anything.
“This is, Cheong-ah….”
“…Shh!”
“Mmng?”
Yi Cheong observed Siwon’s movements reflected in the glass of the display cabinet across from them. After confirming that his hyung was entering the kitchen following Seongyeom, he smacked Seoldong’s shoulder repeatedly to say ‘they one hundred percent showered together.’
…But this bastard, when did his forearm get this thick?
He briefly felt the forearm that had become firmer than his own, but since there was something else important right now, he let it go.
“Jackpot! Did you just see that?”
“Ah, it hurts, Cheong-ah.”
“…Why is this one missing a screw again?”
“Why, what did you see?”
“Ah, won’t you get lost?”
“Haha. Ow.”
Seoldong sneakily wrapped his arm around his waist. Yi Cheong hit the back of Seoldong’s hand hard enough to make a smacking sound. He tried to move away from this disgusting bastard to the side where the hyungs were watching the news, but Seoldong didn’t release the hand wrapped around his waist. Rather, he put more strength into it and even knocked Cheong, who was trying to stand up, back down onto the sofa.
