Normally, it should have been neatly arranged without a single wrinkle.
But right now, there was a jacket sitting right on top of the bed. And he nagged at me about not leaving my clothes lying around anywhere!
I took a deep breath. As I thought, I still don’t know hyung-nim well enough.
Very slowly, I reached out to the jacket and fumbled through the inner pocket. A familiar leather texture touched my fingertips.
There was a wallet.
My whole body tensed at the feel of the leather against my fingertips. My heart was beating so fast, it felt like hyung-nim would hear it.
I took out the wallet and carefully opened it.
“……”
The condom was still there.
I stared at it blankly for a long while.
I hesitated about whether to take the condom out completely, but in the end, I just closed the wallet.
I put the wallet back in the jacket’s inner pocket and carefully hung the jacket back on the hanger. I left the room almost holding my breath so my footsteps wouldn’t make a sound.
As soon as I returned to my room, I closed the door and plopped down on the bed.
“……Haa.”
What the hell am I doing?
Even though I confirmed the condom was still in the wallet, my mood was the worst.
The excitement and anticipation I’d felt waiting for today to come, the hope I’d carefully built up—it had all changed one hundred and eighty degrees because of one small silver wrapper in a wallet.
This is so frustrating. I buried my face straight into the pillow.
Sneaking a peek at his wallet—even though I wasn’t caught, I felt ashamed and sorry toward hyung-nim. With guilt and shame, I thrashed around with my face buried in the pillow.
“I’m really pathetic, so pathetic, this is……”
My voice was muffled in the pillow.
Hyung-nim only treats me affectionately and cherishes me, yet I resent him for breaking his promise with me, and out of jealousy I snuck into hyung-nim’s room and even looked through his wallet.
Hyung-nim would never, ever do something like that.
Unrequited love is such a complicated and sad emotion. The more dazzling the person I like, the more shabby I become.
The expectation that things might go well as they are was all an illusion. I already knew the fact that if things continue like this, I’ll be nothing but a ‘younger brother’ to hyung-nim for life.
Hyung-nim was an attractive man to everyone, someone who could date anyone at any time. I clearly knew that, yet I was heartbroken after experiencing that truth once again.
I, who had been drowning in groundless hope and delusion until now, became aware of the solid wall of reality after seeing the condom in the wallet.
“……”
I lifted my head that had been buried in the pillow the whole time to look for my phone. My eyes, fumbling through the blanket, weren’t wet at all.
Instead, two round dots were spread side by side on the pillowcase.
“This is so frustrating.”
Because I didn’t want to see it, I flipped the pillow over and saw my phone. I immediately opened a search portal.
condom in wallet
My finger hesitated over the search bar. I deleted and rewrote the letters several times.
characteristics of people with condoms in their wallet
Delete.
reasons for carrying condoms
Delete again.
what does it mean to have a condom in your wallet
I finally completed the search term. With trembling feelings, I pressed search and the results came flooding out. I immediately read the most prominent title at the top.
“If you have a condom in your wallet, you’re a slu……”
I squeezed my eyes shut.
*If you have a condom in your wallet, does that make you a slut?*
*What do you think about the saying to avoid men who have condoms in their wallets?*
*5 psychological traits of men who carry condoms in their wallets*
*I found a condom in my boyfriend’s wallet. My boyfriend and I have never once used a condom…*
I pressed one of the titles with trembling hands.
**Title: What do you think about the saying to avoid men who have condoms in their wallets?**
*I’m a 26-year-old omega. Recently I kept attracting trash alphas who only wanted my body, so I got introduced to someone through a friend who was super picky. His job seemed decent and he looked nice, so I was going to just eat and leave, but we ended up having drinks.*
*But when he was paying, a condom fell out of his wallet? LOL*
*I said goodbye and came home and blocked him right away. I didn’t overreact, right?*
*The title is something my friend said, so I don’t know how well-known the saying is.*
**Comments**
*Why did you go home? Were you afraid he was thinking of a one-night stand?*
*Even if he wasn’t thinking of a one-night stand that day, having a condom in his wallet means he’s ready to use it anytime, doesn’t it?*
*└ This 222*
*I would’ve just gone home too. If I’m seriously looking for someone to date, I don’t want to meet someone so sketchy.*
*Wait, don’t most adult men who have some kind of sex life carry them around these days?*
*A guy carrying a condom in his wallet = he’s ready to do it whenever the opportunity arises LOL*
*But honestly, isn’t that being responsible? If you’re someone who has a sex life, it’s better than not carrying one*
*My boyfriend carries them too. I don’t think it’s bad to always carry condoms. But wouldn’t that person have someone they’re seeing?*
*If you don’t have a lover but carry them around, honestly it does look kind of slutty… haha*
I gripped my phone tightly.
The last comment stood out most vividly to me. Looking at other posts, the content was roughly similar.
If a man always carries condoms, there’s a high probability he has a rather active sex life.
I thought hyung-nim was impotent. Apparently not.
“……Hng!”
Tears burst out at that fact.
Bursting into tears, I dove back into the pillow. My throat choked up, and my phone slid off the blanket and dropped to the floor with a thud. Jeongwoo hyung-nim isn’t impotent.
I hated how naturally the image of hyung-nim holding someone else in his arms came to mind, so tears kept welling up.
It was a strange night where breathing in made me feel even more miserable.
***
“Ah, my eyes hurt……”
On weekend morning, I stopped myself from rubbing my eyes.
Huh. Is it because I’ve been crying for several days straight? When I looked at my face on my phone screen, it looked much more swollen. Actually, it might just be from sleeping.
I carefully ran the back of my hand over my eyes. A throbbing sensation traveled all the way to my fingertips. Come to think of it, yesterday too, I fell asleep after crying for over thirty minutes thinking about hyung-nim before bed.
If it’s because of crying, that’s fine, but if it’s not……
“I shouldn’t just tough it out, maybe I should just go to the hospital.”
I slowly exhaled with my stinging eyes closed.
Even so, finals period would be upon me in the blink of an eye, and the deadline I promised myself would cover me before long.
For several days, I hadn’t spent any time with hyung-nim. To be precise, I couldn’t spend time with him.
Even now I haven’t gone out to the living room, but I know hyung-nim isn’t home. I missed hyung-nim so much.
Since I had my phone in hand, I immediately went to the familiar law firm website and looked at hyung-nim’s photo. The face of the perfect representative attorney who would captivate all clients and judges alike.
“Representative-nim, aren’t you way too busy……”
I poked hyung-nim’s cheek on the screen with my finger. I wish I could poke him like this in real life too.
Hyung-nim, who had an important trial coming up, had gotten too busy, and I didn’t bother him. Even though I picked up my phone and put it down repeatedly every night, I never once contacted him in the end.
From the start, hyung-nim and I are guardian and ward.
The briefly rampaging colt had turned back into a high-performance robot vacuum cleaner. When the situation didn’t call for hyung-nim to pay attention to me, I obediently focused on attending classes and doing assignments. Even I was surprised by the change.
As expected, it seems my world really does revolve around hyung-nim. This week’s lecture notes were more thorough than usual, and even during class I tried hard not to miss a single word the professor said.
I thought that living with hyung-nim might solve all my problems, but such a miracle couldn’t happen. There’s no problem in the world that resolves itself.
I was letting out a deep sigh when my phone buzzed on the table next to the bed.
Could it be hyung-nim?!
For a moment I checked the caller with hope, then answered the phone with disappointed eyes. The person calling was Mom.
“Hello?”
— Hajin-ah, Mom bought some red ginseng drinks for you and Jeongwoo hyung to have, okay? Come over and pick them up.
“Red ginseng drinks? Ugh.”
I’m particularly bad with bitter food. But red ginseng—just hearing about it, I felt like I could taste it. Actually, the health tonic she sent when I first moved here is still sitting there untouched……
— What do you mean ‘ugh.’ I heard Jeongwoo is super busy these days, and as a mom I have to do these things, you know, for taking care of my son.
Mom wasn’t swayed by my reaction at all. Right now I’m so troubled because of Jeongwoo hyung-nim, and Mom doesn’t even know how I feel.
