There it was. Seo Heejin’s smooth smile and pretending to be pitiful.
“Oh my, really?”
Deputy Go was innocent and kind. Enough to fall for Seo Heejin’s scam.
“So I was wondering, could I borrow Yunwoo hyung for lunch today?”
While saying that, Seo Heejin placed something on Deputy Go’s desk with a tap. A single chocolate wrapped in gold foil.
Finding that so good for some reason, Deputy Go giggled and answered he could borrow me anytime. I wondered if I was some object to be borrowed or not. Finding it absurd, when I finally looked at Seo Heejin, his eyes had gone crazy long ago. Why! It’s not like it’s the first or second time I refused lunch!
“Hyung, let’s go.”
If only I could, I wanted to break and kill that head nodding readily.
The place Seo Heejin brought me to eat was an ambiguous fusion Korean restaurant for ordinary office workers to visit during lunch, especially for male employees who like to eat quickly and go smoke, to visit alone together.
“Hey.”
“Yes?”
Seo Heejin answered without taking his eyes off the fluttering menu. Detestable Seo Heejin.
“So. What’s the seriously important thing you have to discuss with me?”
At my words, Seo Heejin briefly glanced up at me and returned his gaze to the menu.
After a moment of silence, Seo Heejin revealed that serious matter.
“Ah, that… that blanket you washed and hung up that day, you’ve put it away by now, right?”
Oops. I also turned my gaze to the menu. Even when we ate lunch together last week, I got scolded for not folding the blanket, and the blanket was still up on the drying rack positioned in the middle of my room.
Hmm, why is the menu so difficult?
Brisket beef flank clam doenjang jjigae… With brisket and clams in it, it’s hard to fail. When I gave no answer to Seo Heejin’s question, the menu in my hand was snatched away.
“Don’t tell me you still haven’t put it away?”
“Today, I’ll definitely do it today.”
Ah, really. He’s not even my mom. When I snatched the menu back from Seo Heejin’s hand, Seo Heejin scowled deeply. Seo Heejin’s mood today was cloudy.
Seeing him not give even one of those loose eye-smiles, it wasn’t just cloudy but very cloudy.
“Ah, why. What else. What’s the problem?”
At my irritation, Seo Heejin looked at me quietly and sighed small. I felt like I’d totally get indigestion eating here.
“I’m worried hyung’s laughter is too loose.”
Of all people to say that. More than that, was I laughing while being irritated? Isn’t that an illness? Lunch eating alone with Seo Heejin was indeed awkwardly nauseating. At least Seo Heejin said sorry for making me uncomfortable and paid as an apology, so I let it go—otherwise I would have given him ten, no, twenty knuckle thumps.
After spending lunchtime like that, the next contact came at convenience store time. Strangely, around 4 to 4:30 PM, no matter how much I ate for lunch, I’d magically get hungry. My sugar seemed to drop a bit too.
And Seo Heejin always sent a message timed to that hour.
**Seo Heejin**
You’re going to the convenience store, right? 15:58
At this point, Seo Heejin was controlling my life. When I stood up from my seat after seeing that message, Seo Heejin naturally followed me out.
“Here.”
Seo Heejin bought a chocolate bar with two in a pack and shared half with me.
Holding an energy drink in one hand and a chocolate bar in the other, I felt like a greedy child. Since children don’t drink energy drinks, I should say somewhere between an adult worn out by fatigue and a child who likes sweets.
“Do you think you’ll work overtime today?”
At Seo Heejin’s words, I shook my head while chewing the chocolate bar.
“Not overtime exactly, but I think I’m screwed.”
I answered eagerly without even swallowing everything.
“The promotion sales are too low. What do I do? I need to pull out the inventory I pushed in.”
At my words, Seo Heejin shrugged as if it was none of his business. I didn’t expect an answer from Seo Heejin, but when someone’s talking, at least pretend to listen sincerely.
As I glared at Seo Heejin and put the remaining chocolate bar in my mouth all at once, chewing busily, my hand was grabbed and wiped with a tissue he’d brought from who knows when. The chocolate melting from body temperature and dotting my fingers was already bothering me anyway.
“Drink your beverage too so you don’t choke.”
When I obediently drank the beverage as Seo Heejin instructed, a gaze full of finding me admirable poured out. Even when I turned my head feeling burdened, that gaze persistently followed me.
“Hyung, then… are you depressed today?”
Seo Heejin’s voice overflowed with expectation. It’s not like this bastard performs rituals for me to be depressed.
“I’m not depressed. Don’t even let that thing you’re thinking out of your mouth.”
Seo Heejin muttered disappointedly barely audibly, but I really wasn’t disappointed at all anymore about not sucking Seo Heejin’s cock.
Even during leaving time, I wasn’t free from Seo Heejin.
At this point, I doubted whether Seo Heejin was doing his work properly. Until the day I rolled around with Seo Heejin, he’d leave earlier than me or later. Anyway, we didn’t run into each other while leaving work.
Today was no different. It was when I started organizing my desk after roughly finishing work. I could already feel bustling movement from way over there where I couldn’t even see properly.
Hmm. I pretended to organize then opened a file again and stared at the monitor.
Since Seo Heejin had finished pretending to leave work, he couldn’t not leave. After meaningless clicking, when I sneakily explored toward where Seo Heejin was, I saw Seo Heejin quite flustered that I wasn’t leaving. The guy was at a loss, pointlessly talking to a junior one year below.
That guy’s really going to kill time until I leave.
A senior who was packing to leave sat down for no reason and interfered with this and that, making only that junior miserable. Because of Seo Heejin alone, both that person and I were suffering. Finally when I gave up and stood from my seat, Seo Heejin packed his remaining things. Very obviously.
No matter how fast I walked and hurried out, Seo Heejin who succeeded in catching me in front of the elevator wore a triumphant smile.
“Hyung, are you going home today? Do you have plans?”
“What would you do knowing that?”
“If you don’t have plans, want to eat dinner together?”
Eat lunch together with Seo Heejin, shoot the breeze together at the convenience store. That’s not enough so eat dinner together too?
“I’m going to work out.”
“What should we eat for dinner?”
I’d gotten used to Seo Heejin’s speech pattern where my opinion wasn’t reflected at all.
“I said I’m going to work out. You’re not listening to me again.”
“You can work out tomorrow. Ah, want to go together tomorrow? Hyung, where do you go?”
Seo Heejin’s clutches were finally extending beyond company life to even my personal time. This was something I absolutely had to defend.
“Near my place. You’d go near your place too.”
Even if it’s Seo Heejin, surely he wouldn’t spout the bullshit of moving his gym to near my place 20 minutes away by car.
“I’m looking around other places these days. Is that place okay? Can I go there too? Following along today to see would be good too.”
The word “surely” seemed too generous an expression for crazy Seo Heejin. Ah, so you’re saying you’ll move your gym to near my place 20 minutes away by car? Following me?
The level of thinking was so absurd that I couldn’t even sigh.
Fortunately, the elevator door opened so I didn’t have to answer. In the elevator with just the two of us after normal leaving time had passed, Seo Heejin unhesitatingly fondled my earlobe.
With this level of clinginess, it was hard not to know what Seo Heejin was doing this for. This was definitely flirting done to a romantic partner.
However, I couldn’t distinguish well whether affection that didn’t exist before suddenly surged from having sex with me once, or if he was happy to become close with me when we weren’t on good terms before.
