“Come on, come on. This is all about memories and records and such. It won’t take long, so let’s be generous about it.”
As he said this, Hwan urgently grabbed the hesitant Huiseo’s shoulder and pulled him along. He didn’t know what brilliant excuse Huiseo might come up with if given even a moment to think. So he decided from the start not to give him any time.
“Wait, just a moment.”
Huiseo urgently requested time to prepare himself mentally, but there was no chance of that.
As Huiseo was pulled along in this flustered state, Adrian, who had been waiting from a distance, smiled with an incredibly delighted expression. So Huiseo had no choice anymore. But what was slightly puzzling was that when it came time to actually take the picture, Adrian rather unnaturally positioned Hwan in the middle.
After all, he was the one who first suggested taking a photo, and given the occasion, no one could blame him if he wanted to be the center of attention.
He completely ignored the kind hands trying to place him in the middle, and only after standing in the order of himself, Hwan, and Huiseo—as if it absolutely had to be this way—did he satisfactorily raise his phone camera.
Watching this, Hwan almost shouted “Bro” at him and threw a fist bump.
He’d been wary when Adrian greeted Huiseo in such a friendly manner without permission at their first meeting, but it seemed he had completely misunderstood the situation.
‘Pretty perceptive, aren’t you?’
Thinking this, Hwan wrapped his hand over Huiseo’s shoulder and pulled him closer to his side.
“Smile, Huiseo-ya.”
“…I am, smiling.”
The answer given through gritted teeth couldn’t have felt better.
A smile deepened on Hwan’s face.
Contrary to Hwan’s words that it would be over quickly, their photo session continued several times, even switching phone owners.
Especially when taking pictures with Hwan’s phone, it seemed to be set to rapid continuous shooting mode—the shutter sound went cha-ja-ja-ja-jak! bursting out so noisily that they even captured the moment when Huiseo’s eyes widened in surprise.
After posting those photos to their respective SNS accounts and even tagging each other’s IDs that they had somehow exchanged, today’s event couldn’t have ended more harmoniously.
Though I say it ended, the aftereffects actually continued a bit more in an unexpected place.
It was because of the selfie Hwan and Huiseo posted.
Though there was one more person next to them, in the fans’ eyes, they could filter that out easily enough. No, sorry, but photos with that person literally cut out appeared in the blink of an eye.
Unlike the photo Adrian posted earlier, Hwan posted a photo with a slightly different pose, so the two photos having different atmospheres was another source of joy.
[This isn’t a dream, right? Right?]
[Perseverance always wins ㅠㅠ]
[God god god god, which direction are you in? You haven’t gotten on the plane already, have you? You need to receive my bow before you go ㅠㅠ]
[Hwan’s about to split his cheeks from smiling lololol]
[What’s with Huiseo pouting then smiling? No matter how much you smile, you only get a thumbs up]
[I’m not the only one noticing they made different hearts on each side, right? The one on Huiseo’s side is really full and solid]
That night, lying in bed ready to sleep, Hwan was proudly watching the people of HwanHui’s Garden screaming with happiness. Every time he refreshed, pink-tinted posts poured down, and each time he tapped his finger on the posts that appeared, pleasant giggles leaked out.
“Geez, people really, making such a fuss over this. If we actually take a selfie together just the two of us later, there’ll be chaos.”
He grumbled, pretending otherwise, when he had enjoyed it the most.
In fact, Hwan’s gallery was already piled high with the same photos, just with different editing.
‘No, that’s not right. If the editing’s different, they’re all different photos.’
Depending on how they were edited, each photo’s atmosphere was subtly different, so calling them the same photos was, dare he say, something only an amateur would do. So it was natural to repeatedly hit the save button. And then, as a second step, he had to enlarge and reduce each of those “different photos” several times to examine them more carefully again.
“I guess… this one’s the prettiest?”
Of course, there was the slight complication of this being the fifth time he was saying this, but finally Hwan picked out one photo he liked the most. Normally, Hwan would have thought, ‘Pick just one? They’re all pretty, so why would I need to do that?’ But this time, he simply couldn’t help it.
‘Because I need to change it.’
Change what?
His messenger profile picture, that is.
It might seem easy at first glance, but it absolutely wasn’t. Hwan’s heart went thump-thump-thump as he changed his existing landscape photo to a photo of the two of them in the settings screen and quickly pressed the confirm button.
Seeing that he’d even set this photo as his profile, what would Huiseo say?
Would he be embarrassed? Or would he get angry?
He was scared about what to do if that happened, but honestly speaking, his anticipation was actually a bit greater than his worry. After all, even today he had shamelessly spouted nonsense just to draw Huiseo’s attention. Even if Huiseo just furrowed one eyebrow, Hwan would be so happy he wouldn’t know what to do with himself.
‘…No, but he wouldn’t really frown and be disgusted, would he?’
It would be one thing if it was from embarrassment, but he thought there was no way Huiseo would actually dislike it… Still, there was no knowing until it happened.
To know the answer, he had to wait until Huiseo logged into messenger and checked his profile picture. But with his already impatient heart, Hwan didn’t seem like he could wait until then.
At times like this, he needed to use his wits.
For that reason, Hwan sprang up from the bed like a spring. Then he picked up the math workbook that had been on his desk, which he’d been looking at just moments ago. After that, he hurriedly selected what looked like the longest and most difficult problem among them.
What he needed next was his phone.
Click!
Hwan shamelessly sent a message, pretending he’d been studying all along.
[Huiseo-ya, are you sleeping?]
[(Photo)]
[I don’t really understand this problem, if you’re not asleep could you help me with it?]
The crafty message plastered with feigned innocence was fortunately read by Huiseo right away.
Then he must have definitely checked the changed profile picture too.
‘I wonder what kind of expression Huiseo is making?’
The corners of Hwan’s mouth twitched as he imagined. That wasn’t all. Unable to control his pounding heart, he couldn’t keep his poor fingers still. His restless fingers rapidly tapped around the phone like his heartbeat—tap-tap-tap-tap.
After doing that for a moment, Hwan’s eyes widened at the message that finally arrived.
But the content of Huiseo’s message was quite different from what Hwan had been expecting.
[(Photo)]
[I’m sending you the solution process. Please let me know if there are any parts you don’t understand.]
“……”
‘Is this a work message?’
Hwan’s expression became pouty as he looked at Huiseo’s reply. His feelings were complicated.
No, he definitely must have seen the profile picture, right? But why isn’t he saying anything about it? Is he saying it’s not even worth mentioning? Well, it’s slim, but there was still the possibility he hadn’t seen it yet. After all, he’s someone who has absolutely zero awareness about anything other than studying, even if you wanted to use it for medicine.
‘…Then how do I make him check it naturally again?’
It was around the time the anxious Hwan was wracking his brain, gnawing on his lower lip.
Following the solution process, a cautious message belatedly appeared in the chat window that had gone quiet.
[And]
‘…And? Why? What?’
However, Huiseo’s next message only arrived after Hwan had jerked his head up with gleaming eyes and waited for quite a while.
[Please change your profile picture]
‘I knew it, he saw it!’
He couldn’t control the corners of his mouth rising.
Imagining Huiseo’s appearance—having seen it but then agonizing and hesitating for a long time before sending that message—Hwan even pounded the bed with his fist and buried his face in the pillow.
Unlike just moments ago when he’d merely been curious about what expression Huiseo might be making, now he couldn’t bear wanting to see that face directly. He belatedly regretted that he should have changed it when they were together.
‘No, this isn’t the time. Reply. I need to reply.’
Despite making all that fuss, he typed ‘Why?’ pretending to be calm and unshaken in his reply.
[Why?]
[Because it’s weird]
[What’s weird about it?]
[Just my face]
‘…What’s weird about it?’
Hwan looked at his phone again as if his eyes were dim and he’d seen wrong.
‘How could that face be weird? That face?’
He swore it couldn’t be.
He almost got choked up and typed, ‘What are you talking about, it’s only pretty.’ But thinking about it carefully, he wondered if maybe Huiseo was embarrassed, so Hwan smiled subtly.
[Are you embarrassed?]
[If I say yes, will you change it?]
[No]
At the firm answer, Huiseo was silent for a moment.
[If you don’t like it, take a prettier new one for me?]
When he teased like that, unable to bear the brief silence, Huiseo read it right away but didn’t reply for the rest of the night.
***
Time passed and finally the day of reckoning arrived.
Though there was the slight side effect of having to practically abandon all other subjects, in any case, Hwan—who had devoted himself day and night to math alone—approached the exam with an earnest attitude he’d never shown before. His gesture of receiving the test paper was almost reverent.
Though he wore a grave expression, in truth he was so nervous he kept exhaling rough breaths several times.
‘I’ll do it. 60 points!’
Strength filled his hand gripping the mechanical pencil.
Still, perhaps his earnest efforts over that short time weren’t in vain, as there were definitely more problems visible to his eyes than usual. First of all, he could ‘read’ what the problems were saying. Compared to the old days when he knew nothing and just roughly guessed based on intuition before lying down to sleep, this was tremendous progress.
‘Can’t help it with problems I don’t know.’
Hwan tried hard to calm his anxious heart.
‘Just absolutely don’t miss the problems I do know.’
‘No way am I making careless calculation mistakes.’
Checking even simple addition and subtraction several times, Hwan finished what was the exam of his lifetime.
