While he’d applied sunscreen so excessively on Hwan’s face like an egg ghost, slathering it on thickly.
He himself had gone inside midway yet his heat still hadn’t gone down, so not only his two cheeks but even his nape was flushed red. Seeing that sight under the night sky, Hwan felt somehow ticklish around below his chest. He even swallowed his saliva unnecessarily.
Not knowing that, Huiseo said the village head had boiled the potatoes they’d dug earlier, and since they’d been checked, it was okay to eat them as he set down a plate on the platform. However, watching that, Hwan was only thinking other thoughts.
‘…Living like this wouldn’t be so bad, would it?’
It was such a groundless fantasy.
He wasn’t asking for much. Just like this, in a place no one knew, the two of them with Huiseo.
There, it didn’t matter at all even if he was a prince.
He could dig potatoes like today, plant beans, and even do other things. With the thought of supporting Huiseo, what couldn’t he do? Then Huiseo could farm together with him, or gather the village children and teach them. Like today. He seemed to have quite a knack for it too.
Living harmoniously together like that.
And adding just a bit more of Hwan’s wish.
‘…As much as I like you, you like me too.’
So without worrying about anyone’s eyes, whenever our eyes meet, we could say we like each other, laugh, and kiss.
At such a brief fantasy, Hwan’s heart pounded so much it churned. Just from imagining, it felt so good he felt dizzy. How happy would he be? How joyful?
Intoxicated by that, Hwan let slip a stupid question without realizing it.
“…Shall we run away?”
As expected, Huiseo immediately made an expression asking what he was talking about.
‘He’s surprised.’
No, he was shaken.
His long eyelashes trembling finely told him so. Huiseo couldn’t hide his flustered air. Then soon, slowly blinking once, brown eyes vivid even under the moonlight looked at Hwan and shone.
“Where to? How?”
Huiseo asked that.
At that question, Hwan was rather a bit flustered.
In fact, it was something he’d impulsively blurted out intoxicated by happy but vain delusions, and now being asked to present a concrete plan right away wasn’t easy even for the one who’d brought it up first. Still, since Huiseo seemed to be rarely playing along, Hwan didn’t want to break this mood and tried to fumble out an answer.
Where to?
“Well, somewhere no one would know us… a very deep countryside, or even a small island far from the mainland would be good. If not that, wouldn’t even another country be okay?”
How?
“I may not look it, but I’ve been called to places for diplomacy and whatnot several times, so I know many royal and imperial family kids from other countries. If I ask for help, they might help, right? Why, I even became close with that Adrian kid recently.”
Though it was what he’d said, he still thought it was a pretty plausible answer.
“Well, somehow it’ll work out, won’t it?”
However, having said that, he discovered that for some reason Huiseo’s earlier shaken air had completely disappeared and his eyes had sunk.
‘Wasn’t that the answer he wanted?’
He had to gauge the mood.
“…Why? Don’t you like it?”
Because of that, when Hwan, who’d roughly finished speaking, asked carefully, Huiseo immediately shook his head as if shaking off idle thoughts. Then he answered.
“How can I like or not like it? It’s just a joke anyway.”
Then Hwan’s heart sank with an unnecessary thud.
Though he knew that wasn’t the intention, it seemed there had been a small thorn in Huiseo’s words just now, and a small scratch formed on Hwan’s heart. Because of that, his chest stung, and though he thought something was definitely going wrong, regrettably his mouth moved on its own and agreed.
“Yeah, that’s right. A joke…”
Then Huiseo smiled faintly as if he’d expected that.
The problem was that he shut his mouth tight after that.
Hwan belatedly wanted to hit his own mouth repeatedly. What joke? Why did he say such things there? With one side shutting their mouth and the other unable to find words to say, only awkward silence continued, so eventually Huiseo was the first to stand up, dusting himself off.
“It’s late. You should sleep quickly so tomorrow’s event ends well too.”
It was the right thing to say, but while saying that, Huiseo slipped inside alone under the excuse of preparing for bed.
‘…Did I really do something wrong?’
Watching Huiseo’s retreating back, Hwan felt like even a small stone had now settled in one corner of his heart. That trivial thing was a bit heavy, obstructive, and uncomfortable.
He wanted to ask, but Huiseo’s atmosphere with his back turned somehow felt cold, so his mouth wouldn’t easily open.
Because of that, Hwan ended up losing sleep that night.
***
The next morning, even while waking up earlier than usual and preparing, a cold atmosphere that he couldn’t quite pinpoint continued subtly. Having tossed and turned unable to fall asleep easily during the night, he’d thought ‘Maybe it’s just my own paranoia,’ but it seemed that wasn’t the case after all.
‘…The running away talk was probably pushing it too much.’
As a prince, he might have felt he was quite irresponsible.
‘…I should apologize.’
While helping Huiseo organize the bedding from the side, Hwan kept glancing to gauge his mood.
However, unable to quite catch an opportunity, the place he was dragged to was, as mentioned earlier, a nearby traditional market. If yesterday they’d helped with farm work by digging and packing things directly, today they were going out to the traditional market to promote and facilitate sales of our agricultural products including the potatoes they’d dug… well, that kind of thing.
When Hwan appeared in the market that already had many people due to it being a local festival period, it became chaotic with people swarming over noisily.
There were many fans who’d come to see Hwan after hearing about the event as usual, but this concentration of attention was probably also because traditional markets had relatively more elderly people. Not to talk about something else, but it meant that elderly people were definitely more favorable toward the imperial family than today’s younger generation.
A kind of nostalgia for the past, perhaps.
Because he was imperial family, the eyes of the elderly looking at Hwan shone like children seeing a fascinating sight. Even if direct handshakes were impossible, they wanted to at least make eye contact and hear a word of blessing.
Hwan was very embarrassed and awkward about that.
‘What am I…’
It was complete chaos as if he’d come out for a legislative election campaign or something.
This kind of thing should be done by hyung who’ll become Emperor later. He absolutely couldn’t help grumbling. When coming, he’d been so preoccupied with the matter with Huiseo that he hadn’t realized it, but upon actually arriving and seeing the bustling scene, he whined so much in the car saying he couldn’t get out.
Still, another of Hwan’s strengths was doing things properly when told to.
Entering the market, Hwan became a machine that smiled brightly and warmly spouted blessings.
“Sell a lot.”
“Stay healthy.”
“I hope only good things fill your days.”
“Everything will go well for you.”
“Be happy.”
After rotating such words around with slight variations here and there, when the point finally came where he had nothing left to say no matter how much he squeezed out, Hwan wanted to cry. His facial muscles were on the verge of cramping from smiling continuously.
Thus, as Hwan looked around the market to see if there was some other way to kill time, he happened to discover bright red apples on one side of a fruit store next to him.
‘…Apples?’
Half of it was impulse.
Hwan called over the public relations office staff member who’d been following along beside him the whole time and whispered briefly.
“It’s a bit much to just keep going around greeting people, so how about a picture of me buying something?”
“Oh my, that would be great!”
Then the staff member’s face immediately brightened.
When he’d heard that Hwan was participating in this event, in fact, he’d felt like he’d been struck by lightning from a clear sky. He’d been worried the whole way about what trouble this troublemaker prince would cause today.
But contrary to expectations, he was not only very cooperative, but even suggested good ideas for promotional photos himself, so from his perspective, there was absolutely no reason to refuse. Absolutely yes, absolutely okay.
“Excuse me, how much are these apples?”
So it was good that he actually bought apples. A satisfactory photo was taken of Hwan smiling and receiving a bag of apples too. So the public relations office staff also thought ‘Maybe this is enough now.’
Not knowing that Hwan always caused accidents at such times.
Hwan, who’d immediately put his hand into the apple bag he’d received, picked out the reddest and most luscious apple among them. Then handing it directly to Huiseo was the start of the commotion.
Huiseo, who’d been quietly following one step behind, looked back and forth between that apple and Hwan, who was doing something absurd, with widened eyes.
The public relations office staff and other people who’d swarmed around noisily were the same.
“…What’s this?”
“An apple.”
“I mean, why are you giving it to me…”
Looking at Huiseo asking for a reason, Hwan moved his lips.
He wanted to say he was sorry because he seemed to have hurt Huiseo’s feelings with last night’s matter, but the problem was that since the place was what it was, there were too many watching eyes and listening ears. Especially a few people nearby were watching with shining eyes as if watching a morning drama.
‘Why? Why is he giving it?’
Gazes full of anticipation for what words would come out of Hwan’s mouth followed.
If he said something here about what he did wrong or whatever, who knew what novel the gossip channels would write. Then Huiseo could also become troubled. While they acted more presumptuously themselves, they’d talk about how Huiseo dared to act presumptuously toward a prince.
So Hwan’s answer after thinking it through once was this:
“Just. Because it resembles you.”
Those words while even preciously pressing it into his hand seemed to make Huiseo even more flustered. Like that moment last night, Huiseo’s two cheeks blushed pink.
This time it really was because of Hwan.
‘As expected, aegyo is the best for making up.’
At Hwan’s bright smile, occasional “Oh my, what?” sounds were heard from around them.
