I had said that because I didn’t know how to deal with parents like that, but hyung kept staring at me with a complicated expression as if past memories kept coming to mind, then suddenly got up from his seat and made me stand up too.
“Get up.”
“Huh?”
“I’ll make you steak, so let’s go to the mart.”
As if he was serious, after making me stand up, he dragged me to the dressing room and told me to pick a hat without any warning.
“No, hyung. This is so sudden…”
“You like the steak I grill for you, right? And you liked wine too, but since you’re a minor now, you haven’t had any in a long time. I have a lot of wine at home, so if I make you steak, we can drink it together.”
“Hyung?”
When I looked up at Yoon hyung with a slightly dazed face as he suddenly said he’d make steak, Yoon hyung wasn’t joking and picked out his own going-out clothes with a serious face beside me.
When I stared at him with a blank expression, hyung stopped picking clothes and came over to me, covering my face with one hand.
“So don’t make that expression.”
“…”
“You look ugly when you make that expression.”
He suddenly said he’d make steak and let me drink alcohol, and now he’s saying I look ugly. I was so flustered I couldn’t even answer and just gaped my mouth open and closed, and in the meantime, hyung must have picked a hat because he suddenly put a hat on my head.
Since my hair was a mess, I hurriedly tried to take off the hat, but I stopped my actions at hyung’s following words.
“I’ll feed you delicious food, so just smile. Don’t think about other things.”
“Ah.”
“Let’s go.”
Yoon hyung had always been like that since the old days.
He hated seeing me dejected, and every time he heard about my parents, he would get even more pissed off himself and reach for alcohol.
Looking at Yoon hyung’s back that was still the same, I followed behind hyung and pressed the hat down firmly on my head.
* * *
Go Yoon’s face was somber as he looked at Ka Jerim who had fallen asleep drunk. Go Yoon’s head was complicated, whether because of the lukewarm intoxication rising up or because of what Ka Jerim had said earlier.
“Hohyeon-ah, wake up. Go sleep on the bed.”
It seemed the habit of falling asleep immediately when drunk was still the same. Even when he was Cha Hohyeon, when he got drunk, he would just fall asleep unconditionally even if it was on bare ground, and it was the same even after becoming Ka Jerim.
Looking at Ka Jerim babbling nonsense, he finally gave up on waking him and let out a low laugh. It was cute how he babbled like a baby cooing, and how he smacked his lips as if he was having a dream about eating something.
In the end, Go Yoon cleaned up the bottles scattered around the sleeping Cha Hohyeon and started cleaning. After cleaning for a while and coming back, he clicked his tongue at Cha Hohyeon who had somehow rotated around with his head facing the veranda, sleeping with his stomach completely exposed, and turned his clothes back around.
“Are the clothes too big?”
He hadn’t brought proper pajamas so he had put his own gray hooded sweatshirt on him, but it seemed bigger than expected. In the past, his build was bigger than this, so when he wore clothes like that, they fit perfectly. But now his body had changed, so it was completely baggy, which was somehow strange.
Go Yoon sat at the head of the sleeping Ka Jerim’s bed, quietly looked at Ka Jerim, then stroked his head. As he was playing with the ash-colored hair with a slight purple tint that seemed a bit dry as if he had dyed it again this time, Ka Jerim suddenly opened his eyes.
“Hyuuung.”
“…Huh?”
The flustered Go Yoon stopped the hand he was stroking with. Ka Jerim lay flat on his back and with slightly unfocused eyes, suddenly flailed his hands in the air and said,
“I really looove dolls.”
Since the words he said upon suddenly opening his eyes were that he really loved dolls, Go Yoon tried to hold back his laughter but ended up bursting into laughter with a ridiculous sound.
“You like dolls?”
“Especially ones like piiiigs.”
At the cute confession that he liked pig dolls, Go Yoon couldn’t contain his laughter and burst out laughing while covering his face with his palm. But as if he wasn’t interested in Go Yoon laughing, drunk Ka Jerim just continued his nonsense, listing types of dolls and types of Pokémon to the air.
“But. Pikachu is too much of a pig.”
“Pfft…”
“So it keeps getting stuck between the bed…”
During this parade of nonsense, Go Yoon, who had been roaring with laughter, barely calmed down and asked,
“Why do you like dolls so much?”
The babbling sound stopped. Ka Jerim seemed more sober than before, and his eyes that had been blankly staring at the air until just now had somewhat regained consciousness and were gazing at Go Yoon.
“Hm? Why do you like dolls? How old are you?”
While playfully pinching and shaking his cheek, Ka Jerim who had been shaking along with it blinked his eyes.
“That’s right. Why do I like them?”
Even in the past when he was Cha Hohyeon, he had been crazy about character dolls. So he would always dust off the doll gifts fans gave him and treasure them like they were precious. He even appeared at the airport with dolls dangling from expensive luxury bags that didn’t even match.
“Is it because I couldn’t have even one doll when I was young…”
As if he finally remembered something, Ka Jerim frowned slightly as he recalled that time. Then while closing his eyes again, he muttered,
“So I guess that’s why I liked dolls even when I grew up. Joining Fort was really divine luck no matter how I think about it. Fans gave me dolls too.”
“…”
“The hyungs and fans came to my graduation ceremony too. When I had my elementary school graduation ceremony, no-body came.”
The things Cha Hohyeon had never had while growing up were all fulfilled later through Fort.
No one came to his elementary school graduation ceremony, but at his middle school graduation ceremony and high school graduation ceremony. In all those spaces, the members of Fort were there. That’s why for Cha Hohyeon, Fort was more than just a team—they were family.
“It was really great because the hyungs all treated me well.”
But Go Yoon’s thoughts were different. In fact, Fort wasn’t particularly affectionate with each other at first, and it wasn’t a gathering of altruistic personalities who were good to others.
The reason such a Fort became tightly united was because of Cha Hohyeon. Because Cha Hohyeon was absurdly kind and the kind of guy you wanted to give one more thing to.
‘You made it all like this, you idiot.’
The current Fort could be like family to each other all because of Cha Hohyeon’s efforts, but seeing Cha Hohyeon instead saying he was fortunate to have met Fort made his feelings strange.
‘We should have treated you better when you were here, but what was so grateful about hyungs who only said harsh words that you’re grateful even after death.’
As Go Yoon was thinking such thoughts and quietly looking down at Ka Jerim, Ka Jerim, as if he could no longer overcome the oncoming drowsiness, blinked his eyes slowly while blankly looking up at Go Yoon, then suddenly sat up abruptly.
“Did you sober up?”
Even though he seemed a bit more conscious than before, Ka Jerim who sat facing Go Yoon while swaying as if still intoxicated suddenly burst into a chuckle.
“So I guess I really, really.”
“…”
“Love our hyungs a lot.”
And as soon as he finished speaking, he released all the strength from his body and collapsed onto Go Yoon. Go Yoon reflexively caught Ka Jerim who was in front of him and adjusted him into a comfortable position, and while holding the sleeping Ka Jerim who was breathing peacefully, Go Yoon lowered his head deeply.
“This is driving me crazy.”
What meaning did those words have, it was just the ramblings of a drunk person, but one side of his chest became touched and his face heated up.
Was it because of the alcohol? Yeah, it must be because of the alcohol.
Go Yoon spent a long time cooling down his cheeks that had heated up on their own, then fell asleep next to Ka Jerim side by side.
But how long had they been sleeping, Go Yoon had no choice but to keep waking up to catch Ka Jerim who kept wandering around the house in the middle of the night.
“Hohyeon-ah, what are you doing again?”
Whenever Go Yoon fell asleep even slightly, Ka Jerim would get up again like a ghost and wander around dropping things on the floor.
“This is serious.”
No matter how he looked at it, it seemed like sleepwalking. Go Yoon hugged Ka Jerim who was rummaging through the living room with a serious face and slowly laid him down. This was already the fourth time.
‘Since when did these symptoms start? It’s this serious, so why haven’t the members gotten it fixed yet?’
In fact, Ka Jerim’s sleepwalking and severe sleep talking were getting better day by day compared to before.
In the past, if he had been forced to lie down like this, he would have struggled like having a seizure to shake off the person holding him, but Go Yoon had never seen Ka Jerim’s previous state, so he was seriously worried even with just this state.
“No.”
As soon as he laid him down, he grabbed the shoulder of Ka Jerim who was trying to get up again and laid him down. But Go Yoon, who noticed the sign of Ka Jerim trying to get up again, eventually sat down with his knees up with Ka Jerim in the middle and pressed down firmly on Ka Jerim’s shoulders.
“Shhh.”
As Ka Jerim’s struggling to get up while frowning gradually stopped, Go Yoon’s expression as he let out the breath he’d been holding was serious.
He had stayed up all night working yesterday, and not long after coming home, Ka Jerim had come. On top of that, they had drunk alcohol, so even though Go Yoon was the type who didn’t sleep much normally, deep drowsiness was pressing down on him enough to make his eyelids heavy.
‘I need to sleep too.’
But he couldn’t fall asleep. He was worried that Ka Jerim might get hurt wandering around alone while he was asleep.
“Should I just lock him up?”
Go Yoon was thinking about whether he should carry Ka Jerim and lock him in a room, then looked at the common point between his and Ka Jerim’s clothes.
Ka Jerim was wearing a gray hooded sweatshirt, and he himself was wearing a navy hooded sweatshirt. As soon as he saw that, Go Yoon, who had a good idea, grabbed the zipper strings attached to his and Ka Jerim’s hoodies and tied them together.
‘This should work.’
He had tried hugging him to sleep and holding his hand to sleep several times before, but it wasn’t an easy task to immediately notice Ka Jerim moving while sleeping.
