Clearly, Yujeong hadn’t been like this when they first met. Rather than his personality changing, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say his attitude had done a complete 180. Back then, Yujeong had shown nothing but icy reactions to Seongjo’s every word.
Seongjo answered with a voice tinged with amusement.
“Right? You were so prickly at first, what made you change your mind? When did you become like this?”
A somewhat troubled expression colored Yujeong’s face. Seongjo asked again, deliberately mixing in some playfulness.
“Did you dislike me?”
He had no intention of saying he’d been angry or hurt, subtly dropping hints like that. He was simply genuinely curious about what Yujeong had been thinking. This time, Yujeong didn’t answer right away and averted his gaze. Instead, he simply looked at Seongjo without a word.
After a long while, Yujeong opened his mouth.
“It wasn’t that I disliked you, even back then…”
A small voice. For a moment, Seongjo couldn’t tell whether it was a powerless voice or an embarrassed one. Yujeong quietly continued.
“I just had a lot on my mind.”
He certainly seemed that way.
It wasn’t that Seongjo was thoughtless either. He was far from someone who acted without thinking.
If Yujeong was the type to comprehensively consider multiple factors all at once when making a judgment, taking his time to carefully reach a conclusion, then Seongjo was the type to quickly think through only what was immediately necessary and reach a conclusion just as fast. The difference between the two stemmed from that point.
Seongjo nodded, murmuring “You do seem that way.” Not that he thought it was a bad thing.
Yujeong seemed lost in thought. Seongjo said with a hint of amusement.
“Now I can tell quite a bit about Teacher Jeon’s mood without you saying anything, but today you’re even being honest.”
Being able to read the inner thoughts of a man whose intentions were hard to discern was significant progress. It was probably a change that came about because Yujeong, who at first had tried not to reveal what he was thinking at all, had gradually begun confessing himself.
Seongjo thought for a moment. What would it be like if he were to meet that initial Yujeong again at this point? Looking with his current eyes, he felt like he might understand what he’d been thinking. At least Yujeong wouldn’t feel as cold as he had when they first met.
While they were having such a conversation, the rain that had been steadily drumming against the car window gradually weakened. Then at some point, it stopped completely.
To be precise, it had been a downpour falling only in a specific area from the start, and once they passed through that section, the weather cleared. The wet wheels of the car carrying Seongjo and Yujeong left tracks on the road that showed no trace of having been rained on.
“You have arrived at your destination. Navigation ended.”
Finally, hearing the navigation’s voice, he turned off the engine. Checking his phone, which had its battery half-drained from being used as navigation, the time was close to eleven at night. Not only the time spent driving on the highway, but the traffic jam in the first section had eaten up more time than expected.
It was already the middle of the night. It was late enough to go straight to bed. His body was quite tired from the long drive. But Seongjo didn’t show his fatigue and got out of the car.
As soon as he opened the car door, the salty breeze of the night sea rushed in. It was quite a cool wind. However, having been confined in the car for several hours until just a moment ago, he didn’t feel cold. Rather, it was refreshing. Seongjo stretched one arm forward as if to feel the direction of the wind.
Though he’d come to this place for Yujeong, now that they’d arrived, Seongjo himself felt as happy as he’d hoped to be. If it weren’t for Yujeong, he wouldn’t have come here tonight, so he was actually grateful to him.
As he took a deep breath, the sticky, humid sea air penetrated deep into his lungs. Exhaling that breath again in a long stream, Seongjo said as if spitting it out.
“Ah, this is nice.”
Seongjo, who had made a visor with his hand to hold down his windblown hair, murmured with relief. Soon after, he turned his head toward Yujeong. It was to throw out something like ‘See? Isn’t it nice that we came?’
But the moment their eyes met, Yujeong struck first.
“Do you like me, Lee Seongjo-ssi?”
…What?
For a moment, Seongjo froze stiff like a stone statue.
…Was he joking? In response to Seongjo’s own “Ah, this is nice”?
But there was no time to confirm whether those words were a joke or not. Having finished speaking, Yujeong immediately turned around and started walking. And not toward the sea and sandy beach, but in the opposite direction.
Seongjo, who had been standing still for a moment in bewilderment, hastily closed the driver’s side door, locked it with the car key, and followed Yujeong.
If he thought of it as a joke, being this flustered was even stranger. Yet for some reason, he found himself moving jerkily like a broken machine.
The direction Yujeong headed was toward the shopping area. Perhaps because of the late hour, all the sushi restaurants and fishing supply shops lined up in a row had closed, but the convenience store still had its lights on.
At a display stand placed in front of the convenience store, they were selling fireworks sets. After examining the display carefully for a moment, Yujeong picked up a fireworks set and entered the convenience store.
It wasn’t like he could interrogate him about what he’d meant by those words just now in front of the part-timer. With complicated feelings, Seongjo followed him in and looked around the convenience store.
Should he buy some alcohol to drink? If alcohol got involved, could he dig out Yujeong’s true feelings? But he quickly abandoned that thought. He already knew well what Yujeong’s alcohol tolerance was like. Even if he bought out half the alcohol on display and took it with them, it didn’t seem like he could get Yujeong drunk.
Looking at the refrigerator lined with alcohol and beverages, a thirst he hadn’t been conscious of washed over Seongjo. Now that he thought about it, he hadn’t drunk even a sip of water the entire time he was driving, so it made sense that he was thirsty. If anything, it was surprising that he hadn’t noticed until now.
Yujeong hadn’t drunk anything either. Seongjo opened the refrigerator door to buy drinks for both himself and Yujeong.
Since he just needed to quench his thirst, would water be best? Getting barley tea for Yujeong wouldn’t be bad either. Or maybe a sports drink…
As Seongjo was peering into the refrigerator with such thoughts, a label caught his eye.
A plastic bottle with pink and light green mixed in a gradient, and a plastic bottle with green and orange arranged on it. Next to them was one with red and yellow mixed together.
‘It’s Back!’ Pineapple Peach
‘It’s Back!’ Guava Orange
‘NEW!’ Tomato Mango
At the familiar names, Seongjo let out a short laugh without thinking.
Pineapple Peach and Guava Orange. These were drinks with memories attached for Seongjo. Though they were memories with Yeongbeom that had ended horribly, he couldn’t help but recall them the moment he saw the names.
This drink line had been discontinued long ago without anyone knowing. It was only natural. Except for a very small group of enthusiasts, it had a terrible taste that no one would seek out.
He had no idea who had proceeded with a re-release with phrases like ‘It’s Back!’ There usually had to be demand for a re-release to happen. Had there really been that many people who missed these drinks?
Soaked in nostalgia, he knew that if he bought this, it would taste terrible. But Seongjo, immersed in emotions that might have been curiosity or longing, picked up the drinks anyway. The two bottles except for the one marked ‘NEW,’ Tomato Mango.
Seongjo headed to the counter with two bottles of the drinks in one hand and two bottles of water in the other. Yujeong had already finished paying for his share and left the convenience store. Though he wouldn’t have been able to strike up a conversation anyway because of the convenience store part-timer’s presence, he seemed to be doing his best to postpone the conversation.
But wasn’t the grace period limited to when he walked out the door? Yujeong had also purchased a fireworks set. Unless he was planning to light the fireworks alone a hundred meters away from Seongjo, exchanging words was inevitable.
With a relaxed mindset, Seongjo paid for the drinks and walked out the door. At the jingling sound of the bell, Yujeong turned to look at Seongjo. Seongjo held up the plastic bag in his hand and said, his voice carrying a faint hint of amusement.
“We need to finish what we were talking about earlier, don’t we?”
