Whether it was because I was drunk or simply because the distance was far, I couldn’t see the man’s face well. It seemed like he was looking this way though. I rubbed my eyes with my hand and looked again.
The man, who stood motionless with one hand in his pocket, brought his other hand to his mouth. Now that I looked, it seemed the man was standing there smoking a cigarette for a moment.
I couldn’t see his face well, but the sight of smoke scattering in the night air was clear.
Hmm, our hyung-nim doesn’t smoke. He’s not as good as hyung-nim.
“Uh……”
At that moment, my mouth hung open blankly. Now that I looked, the man was standing next to a car parked on the street. But that car was too familiar.
No matter how I look at it, that’s hyung-nim’s car, isn’t it?
“Hyung-nim……?”
I blinked slowly.
The man ground out the cigarette in what looked like a portable ashtray. Hyung-nim doesn’t smoke anymore, but when he did smoke, I had imagined he might carry something like that around.
“Wow, what’s with that person. He’s incredibly handsome.”
Soon after, the man turned around and went into a convenience store. The man who quickly came out after buying something didn’t head to his car but started crossing the street. As his face got closer, my mouth opened wider.
“Huh? He’s coming this way? Is he someone you know?”
“Uh……”
A gait I could perfectly recognize, a beautiful face that became clearer as he approached. There was no doubt, it was clear. It was Jeongwoo hyung-nim.
A moment later, hyung-nim stopped in front of me. I was still crouching and slowly lifted my head.
But hyung-nim wasn’t looking at me.
For some reason, hyung-nim was looking down not at me, but at Lee Taehyung who was crouching close beside me.
“……Hyung-nim?”
At my words, Lee Taehyung’s eyes widened. His face, flushed red from drinking, looked back and forth between me and hyung-nim.
“Huh? This person is your hyung-nim?”
Hyung-nim’s face was still expressionless and unreadable. The hyung-nim I talked to on the phone earlier clearly seemed very angry, but now it wasn’t quite like that. Instead, this time he looked at me and opened his mouth quietly.
“Jihyeon?”
“……”
“Your hair color is different.”
It was hyung-nim’s voice, neither high nor low, the same as usual. Even though it was clearly a face and voice where emotions couldn’t be read, somehow I felt a cold air right now.
“Ah, hyung-nim, hello—! I’m not Jihyeon, I’m Lee Taehyung.”
Lee Taehyung got up from his seat and bowed in greeting.
“I’ve gotten meals and coffee from Hajin a few times. Each time I heard it was hyung-nim who bought them, so I was curious what kind of person you were, and now to meet you directly like this……”
Ah, hyung-nim nodded and smiled.
A splendid adult’s smile. I couldn’t find anything else on hyung-nim’s face besides that.
Why? The atmosphere was quite different from a moment ago. Anyway……
Hyung-nim is incredibly handsome. Looking at him like this, he’s even cooler. I looked at his smoothly curved lip line and a grin came out.
Even the cold air I felt for a moment now seemed like I might have imagined it because I was drunk.
Anyway, maybe it’s because he’s so tall, but it wasn’t easy to look up at hyung-nim while sitting like this.
While Lee Taehyung’s greeting continued, my gaze gradually moved down from hyung-nim’s face. Hyung-nim was holding one strawberry milk and one chocolate milk in his hands.
At the same time I was about to reach out, hyung-nim offered the milk.
Without much thought, I reached for the closer chocolate milk, but strawberry milk naturally came into my hand.
“You drink this too, friend.”
“Wow, thank you!”
The rest must have been for Lee Taehyung. Then hyung-nim also gave each of us a straw.
While I could hear the two people’s voices saying something or other, I slowly inserted the straw into the milk carton. When I put it to my mouth and sucked, cold and sweet milk went down my throat. It’s incredibly delicious.
“Hajin, drink your milk for a moment. Don’t move.”
“Okay.”
I put the straw back in my mouth. Lee Taehyung and hyung-nim’s legs headed inside the bar.
Not long after, hyung-nim appeared again. As if he had come out after paying, the hand holding his wallet also showed a receipt.
“Did you have fun? Even turning off your phone.”
While staring blankly at that sight, I suddenly became curious about something.
“Hyung-nim, hyung-nim.”
“Yeah.”
“Hyung-nim.”
“What.”
I felt like if I didn’t ask this right now, I’d be curious about it forever.
Actually, it was a thought I had while drinking milk just now.
“But…… how did you know I was here?”
A very brief silence passed.
“Hajin told me. When we talked earlier.”
“Huh, I did?”
I blinked while retracing my memory. But in my current drunken state, even that wasn’t an easy task. For now, my head was too foggy. Come to think of it, I was quite drunk earlier too.
“I said that……”
Honestly, from the moment I heard hyung-nim’s words, I was already accepting it.
Listening well to hyung-nim’s words is like a habit ingrained in my body for life.
“Tsk, why did I do that? I didn’t want to tell him……”
Still, I was somewhat indignant. Today was a bit different.
“I’m sure even my mom and dad wouldn’t interrogate me like this. I think I was thinking that.”
“I get it, so finish talking in the car. You’ll catch a cold.”
At that moment, a hand came under my arm. My body was lifted up and before I knew it, I was standing facing hyung-nim.
Something was strange. And I wasn’t the only one who felt the strangeness.
Hyung-nim looked at me for a moment, then took a step back.
“Kid, don’t tell me you can’t walk right now?”
Huh?
“No? I can walk though?”
At hyung-nim’s single comment, I took a step as if my legs were moving on their own. Of course, the problem was that I was considerably drunk.
Actually, the moment I stood up earlier, the world spun around. And I clearly moved my feet six times but was still in the same place.
“Just how much did you drink……”
Hyung-nim’s expression was gradually worsening.
“W-wait a moment.”
“……”
“This isn’t me staggering, it’s my legs moving on their own.”
Hyung-nim tried to carry me on his back, but I earnestly refused.
I barely managed to put strength in my legs and stand, but hyung-nim sighed, then went behind me and grabbed my shoulders. From then on, I walked relying on hyung-nim’s hands. As if I had returned to my childhood.
Even though I stole a condom, he came to pick up drunk me and even bought milk for my friend too. I didn’t know what all this was, but I felt good.
Hyung-nim is really strange and kind.
***
Unlike the cool air outside, the air inside the car was warm.
After getting in the car, I sat in the passenger seat and quietly rolled my eyes. Honestly, rather than where the car was heading or hyung-nim’s expression, I was busy thinking about other things.
“First answer the question I’m asking. Where are you right now?”
“Tell me where you are right now.”
“Hajin-ah, I’m asking you where you are, who you’re with, and what you’re doing right now.”
When hyung-nim asked me where I was like that, did I really tell him my location?
I don’t think so, I don’t think I said it……
I glanced at the driver’s seat. I could see hyung-nim’s composed profile.
A jawline that became clearer each time the streetlight’s glow brushed past it. Eyes that seemed tired and looser than usual.
After fiercely demanding to know where I was as if angry, hyung-nim was now in a calm state.
I still had the strawberry milk carton in my hand.
“What are you thinking about?”
“……What?”
While I was stealing glances at his profile, hyung-nim’s voice suddenly came. Does hyung-nim have eyes on the side of his head?
“Ah, it’s nothing.”
“Was the group date fun? You kept being curious about it.”
No matter how much I retraced my memory, I had never told hyung-nim where the group date location was.
Where I was…… it seems like I said it earlier, but it also seems like I didn’t. Thoughts soaked in alcohol floated around in my head.
Well anyway, I was drunk, and I listen to hyung-nim’s words really well.
“So-so, it was fun. Hyung-nim told me I absolutely should go.”
“When did I say absolutely.”
I couldn’t find any anger in the voice speaking indifferently.
“I said it would be good to go out since you have a lot of things you want to do.”
“……”
“What I said was a light suggestion, your ‘absolutely’ is coercion.”
I stared at hyung-nim intently. After being in the cold outside and now being in the warm car, I was gradually becoming drowsy.
“Hyung-niim.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“Earlier……”
My eyes blinked slowly even while speaking. My voice was also slower than usual.
“No, I think I said where I was, but there’s no way I asked you to come pick me up…… I hung up because you seemed angry.”
“So Hajin hangs up the phone when he thinks I’m angry.”
“And I thought I’d get scolded terribly when I went home tomorrow and would even get kicked out of the house.”
“What do you mean tomorrow. You told me you’d be home late, not that you’d stay out overnight.”
I heard a tongue-clicking sound.
“So you really were planning to stay out overnight.”
Hyung-nim muttered lowly.
That’s not what I meant…… well, that wasn’t what was important right now anyway.
“Anyway, so I already thought I’d get scolded when I went home, so I don’t think I would have asked you to come pick me up…… I don’t think I’m stupid enough to do that, but it also seems like I might be……”
Honestly, even what I was saying right now wasn’t organized in my head.
“So, what are you curious about.”
Hyung-nim said.
“……I was wondering if you maybe came to catch me on purpose.”
“That’s right.”
The car happened to stop, and hyung-nim’s gaze turned toward me.
“Why did I do that.”
Hyung-nim’s brow was furrowed. As if even he himself found it strange.
