Saehyeon stopped in place, panting heavily. His lungs pounded inside his ribcage as if they were about to burst, and sweat poured down like rain.
“Huu.”
Exhaling hot breaths, Saehyeon raised his head to look at the sky. The sun, which had started growing longer, was scattering fierce light despite it being early morning.
Summer was already approaching. Saehyeon could finally feel the passage of time through the change of seasons. When he had awakened in his 28-year-old body, and when he had met Gil Taeseo, it had been the season when white breath came out.
He was quite sensitive to cold, and since clothes weren’t readily available, he’d worn several layers of old clothes. But at some point, the clothes gradually became thinner, and now he’d break a sweat just from running around in a single t-shirt.
‘Has this much time already passed?’
Counting vaguely, it seemed like it had already been several months since he’d entered ‘this kind of’ relationship with Gil Taeseo.
‘Three months… or maybe a bit more.’
Saehyeon raised the hand he’d been counting with to wipe away the sweat beading at the tip of his chin.
“Appa. Tired?”
The child, who had been looking back and forth between the rolling ball and his stopped father, quickly made his choice. His footsteps were light as he ran back the distance he’d worked so hard to cover. He didn’t care at all that the colorful ball he cherished so much was rolling far away into the grass.
The child who came running over bowed his head deeply. His abundant hair poured down in reverse following the movement.
The sight of the child’s small head peeking into his downward gaze was quite amusing. Eventually, Saehyeon let out a small laugh. And answered.
“Yeah…”
Honestly, it had been a bit much for him since earlier. He was so drenched in sweat that even the child could tell it was a lie, so he’d said all that needed to be said.
In proportion to the passage of time, Saehyeon’s body was in much better condition than before. Though there was still a long way to go to return to normal levels. Still, just being able to run and play with the child outside like this was a dramatic improvement. Normally, he probably would have collapsed, out of breath.
“Then appa can go inside now. I played a lot!”
“Still… I think I can do more.”
Just as the peeking child and the hesitant, skinny young man were about to start a discussion about extending or ending their time, the window leading to the garden opened with a slight scraping sound.
Saehyeon and the child’s gazes turned there simultaneously.
“It’s almost summer, so you’ll get dehydrated if you keep that up.”
The middle-aged woman standing inside the window had an overall neat and gentle impression. She was one of the few people who had started coming and going from this house at some point.
“I’ve prepared some cool tea, so come up and have this now.”
She was friendly but not loose-lipped, gentle but not merely soft-hearted. She was a very exquisite person. As if someone with a truly terribly picky personality had put great care into selecting her, there was nothing to find fault with.
For Saehyeon, who had grown up among aunties who would click their tongues saying he was pitiful and unfortunate whenever they saw him, this was a strange thing.
The child ran over in one go and clung to the woman’s apron. Then he looked at the glass on the tray with sparkling eyes.
“This is totally red! Woww.”
“It’s omija tea, would the young master like to try some too?”
“Yess!”
The housekeeper had appeared not long after Saehyeon had started coming and going to this house with the child.
When the child said he was hungry, Saehyeon had rolled up his sleeves. He’d rummaged through the refrigerator and cupboards to find cooking utensils, then tried to make something simple.
‘…My cooking skills that the King of Hell would reward are still going strong.’
The problem was that Gil Taeseo, who had just returned home, discovered it. Though he looked like he’d barely survived hellfire, this was something Saehyeon could have just eaten himself. The housekeeper coming in the next day was excessive fuss.
The woman’s eyes, having left the child, also reached Saehyeon, who was standing awkwardly.
“Baby’s dad should come up quickly too.”
“…Yes.”
Baby’s dad. Saehyeon rolled those words around small in his mouth. He was still unfamiliar with this title.
The relationship between Gil Taeseo and Saehyeon was being maintained in quite a peculiar way. Saehyeon spent time going back and forth between this house and his previous house with the child. Though there were fewer days when he slept at the previous house.
Though complex emotions were sometimes troublesome, his body had become quite comfortable, excluding secret matters. He ate well, slept and woke at proper times without reversing day and night, and didn’t particularly work, so it would be stranger if it wasn’t comfortable.
Perhaps the decisive factor was that damn pheromone that Gil Taeseo periodically provided.
“The teacher will be here soon, so let’s brush your teeth and wait.”
“Yess!”
And he couldn’t help but acknowledge the contribution in this area as well. Each time the child came here, he spent time meeting the gentle housekeeper and the kind visiting teacher.
When Gil Taeseo had first gotten the teacher and housekeeper on his own, Saehyeon had honestly worried. The child didn’t particularly welcome strangers and had adamantly refused daycare.
‘Appa, I wanna! I’ll work really hard so with appa….’
But Gil Taeseo had finalized the arrangement after having a private interview with Mini. Contrary to his doubts, it was a good choice in the end. The child was actually brighter and had better color than before, and followed the two people well. Though not as much as himself.
Only then did Saehyeon realize that the child, like him, had been enduring something.
This was one of the advantages gained from his relationship with Gil Taeseo. Getting to know the child a bit better. Though not mentally, it was something possible because there was now leeway physically and financially.
“Huu.”
Saehyeon stood in front of the sink and looked at the man in the mirror. He felt a strange sense of déjà vu. The scene he’d encountered in the mirror when he first woke up in his 28-year-old body briefly overlapped before his eyes.
But that afterimage washed away like soapy water when he closed and opened his eyes. The white face with water dripping from it was still white and thin.
But at least it wasn’t a corpse-like complexion. The shadow that had lingered like a tattoo under his eyes had also faded considerably. Now it looked like a natural shadow below his aegyo-sal.
“Not bad.”
Saehyeon, who had been scrutinizing his face thoroughly, muttered quietly. At this level, even if people thought he looked feeble and like he’d collapse if poked, he didn’t look like he was ready for a coffin right away.
Below his slender neckline, a t-shirt with a soft texture and clean design was layered with a thin blue shirt.
The reflection was brief. Saehyeon, who had been taking deep breaths while looking in the mirror as if steeling his resolve today as well, turned his body decisively. He stepped over the bathroom threshold while shaking the remaining water from his hands into the air.
It was to move on to the next routine.
“Well then, I’ll be going.”
“Mmm… come back quickly.”
Even though the two adults the child liked next after his dad would be with him the whole time, the child made a disappointed expression at this moment every time.
Saehyeon, who had roughly shoved his feet into his sneakers, lowered his body to crouch down. His eyes roughly met the level of the child, who had grown taller in the meantime.
“What should I buy you when I come back?”
“Really? Then ice cream!”
“Chocolate?”
“Strawberry too!”
His remaining conscience, small as it was, complained of pain whenever the child looked disappointed, but Saehyeon couldn’t help it. He couldn’t take the child with him at this moment. Because from now on, he was going to receive that fucking ‘treatment’ for this session.
Saehyeon stood up and bowed his head. Unnecessary awkwardness made Saehyeon fidget.
“Um… I’ll be in your care again today.”
“Yes, of course.”
A young omega who keeps coming and going to a luxurious house and leaving his child behind. He had no idea what she must think of him.
Passing through the now-familiar desolate garden, Saehyeon climbed into the jet-black car. When he first came to this house, he’d been taken as if kidnapped with the child held hostage. Now, not only did he get in by himself, but he was getting more and more used to it.
To the point where he wondered if it was okay to get this used to it.
With a stuffiness from somewhere unknown, Saehyeon familiarly rolled down the window. After driving for a while, tall buildings began to mix into the background that had only shown passing trees and grass.
The ‘treatment’ that Saehyeon and Gil Taeseo conducted mostly took place outside, except for the early stages. It was because Saehyeon had desperately insisted.
“…Is there traffic by any chance?”
He noticed the sense of incongruity after driving for quite a while. There was a set route to Gil Taeseo’s house in the city center or the hotel they frequently went to. Considering the average time, they should have arrived much earlier, but the car still hadn’t stopped.
Wondering just how bad the traffic was, he looked outside, but the scenery was strangely unfamiliar. The tall skyscrapers stretching up high were clearly the center of a commercial district he was seeing for the first time.
Saehyeon threw a question at the man sitting in the driver’s seat. Yoon Changwook answered with slightly twisted pronunciation at the end.
“Today I’m to take you to the office.”
Hearing those words, somehow his hands and feet went ice cold.
“…The office? Why?”
“I don’t know that much either…”
Even asking again didn’t produce an answer, so Saehyeon swallowed his saliva and entered the building. Throughout the ride up in the private elevator, his stomach churned with a strange anxiety.
Fuck, I should have noticed something was off back then.
