Won Dogyeong patted my face dry and rubbed my cheek with the back of his hand.
“Are you okay? Does your head hurt?”
“Yeah.”
The drama we were watching ended, so I roughly changed the channel and turned on a rerun of some variety show. It was a program where celebrities went on gourmet trips, and I was glad to see a restaurant we’d once waited in line to eat at.
Separately from that, that place wasn’t actually that delicious, but the panelists were praising it so much that I clicked my tongue, saying you really can’t trust broadcasts. The shaved ice they went to eat for dessert looked pretty good though.
“Should we go get shaved ice too?”
“It’s too hot right now. If we’re going, let’s go later in the afternoon.”
When I checked the weather, the temperature was over 30 degrees and I could hear the pitter-patter of rain. It seemed like the rain would stop from around 3 or 4 PM, so that would be better.
And then I nodded off while watching TV, hit by a blood sugar spike. It was clear that two bowls of rice plus high-calorie potato chips had delivered the final blow.
Won Dogyeong couldn’t bear to watch me jerk my head awake from sleep several times, so he pressed down on my shoulder and laid me on his lap. With my cheek squished, I blinked and fought the sleep demon. I wanted to stay awake for no reason.
However, despite my efforts not to fall asleep, my eyelids were endlessly heavy. My consciousness sank into darkness at the regular rhythm patting my arm as if telling me to give up and sleep, then I’d wake up groggily, repeating this cycle.
During this time, Won Dogyeong binge-watched various dramas like handling work tasks while ticklishly stroking me. His gentle touch moved over my shoulder and neck, past my earlobe, to the bangs cascading down my forehead.
In the peaceful air with the air conditioner breeze flowing gently, I suddenly thought of my childhood.
In elementary school, when summer vacation started, I spent all day long with Won Dogyeong. It was the same during the school term if you could say that, but since we were in different classes, we were apart during lessons, whereas during vacation we really held onto each other completely and killed time.
When a scary scene came on while we were watching TV at Won Dogyeong’s house and Doa cried, we’d flee to my house, and when we were laughing and playing games at my house and hyung got angry, we’d flee back to Won Dogyeong’s house.
Sometimes we’d go out through the scorching sun and run around the playground. We’d often mix with other friends and play games like cops and robbers or escape from hell.
Even back then I hated the heat, so after a couple rounds I’d drag myself out and sit on a bench to rest. Won Dogyeong would run around for a while, and when he got tired of it, he’d slink over to my side and throw a tantrum saying it’s no fun.
Even when the kids called for him and I’d tap him saying they’re calling you, the way he’d turn his head with a huff saying I want to be with you was so cute I wanted to bite him.
Won Dogyeong was a bit shy until then, and though he was somewhat stubborn, he was generally honest. Though he was already taller than me.
On the way home after running around the neighborhood all day, there was a small stationery store where we’d always buy junk food.
Once we got caught by Yeo Daun eating candy that turned our tongues blue and both got them confiscated. But actually, our noona who we ran into passing by had bought it for us. It would have been nice if they’d unified their childcare policies.
After that, going home to write in our diaries was the day’s finale. It was vacation homework, but Won Dogyeong hated writing diaries, so he’d always stare intently at what I was writing and plagiarize it without changing a single word. Good thing we were in different classes.
Sometimes we’d also often eat dinner together at each other’s houses.
Won Dogyeong liked the bacon and potato stir-fry my mom made. Now I make it for him occasionally. I learned it from mom after we started living together.
It’s one of the few dishes I know how to make, along with bean sprout soup for hangovers. Somehow it seems like everything I know how to make was learned to feed Won Dogyeong.
After finishing our daily routine, we’d turn on the electric fan, eat watermelon, then sprawl on the floor and doze off.
When I’d wake up in the morning after sleeping soundly to the background noise of the rattling wings turning, my head would be fuzzy and I’d have to think hard about whose house this was.
Even now, with hands tousling my hair instead of the fan breeze, I had that same nostalgic feeling and it was strange.
Twenty years ago, ten years ago, we spent summer together like this.
And probably we would in the future too.
Ten years from now, twenty years from now, keeping each other close.
Starting next year, we’d have to teach Yongyong the way we’ve spent summers too.
We’d have to feed them watermelon, teach them about napping with the fan on, and teach them how hard it is to run around the playground in the scorching sun.
Wait, hold on. That means I have to go out in the scorching sun too.
Can’t I be in charge of winter walks and Won Dogyeong be in charge of summer walks?
…We’re not dogs, that’s probably a bit much. Just going out isn’t everything.
Should I also teach them about the blue candy…?
But those things are only delicious when you eat them secretly. Let me think about it.
Also… from how many months can you eat ice cream? Huh?
Ice cream?
…Shaved ice.
Shaved ice!
I opened my eyes wide.
“Let’s go out.”
“You scared me. What, weren’t you sleeping?”
“I was sleeping. I woke up.”
I stretched and sat up. The time was past four. Perfect.
I yawned and went to the room to rummage through the drawers. The elastic waist pants should be here somewhere.
The doctor said I seemed to have less of a protruding belly even among male omegas. I think so too. Until a few weeks ago, I really doubted from time to time whether there was anything in there—it was exactly the same as usual. Now a gentle hill had appeared.
Actually, I know my own body so I can feel it, but with clothes on, it still doesn’t show at all.
Still, I was starting to feel self-conscious about wearing the clothes I’d been wearing to work as is, so I bought a few pairs of pants with elastic waists. From the outside you couldn’t really tell, but strangely, pants were getting a bit tight now. Where exactly had swelled up?
The newly bought pants were all black, so if I covered the waist, they looked somewhat like slacks. On top of that, if I stole and wore t-shirts Won Dogyeong didn’t wear much, my work outfit was complete.
I liked dressing up somewhat for the office, so I originally wore shirts often, but suddenly wearing oversized t-shirts, I got an earful from people around me asking what’s the occasion. Since I hadn’t explained the situation yet, I just brushed it off saying I gained weight.
Won Dogyeong always teases me saying I look like a college student dressed like that. There’s no way.
At best I’d look like a twenty-nine-year-old late-blooming college student.
“Did you put on sunscreen?”
“No.”
At my answer, Won Dogyeong dragged me along, sat me on the sofa, and started slathering sunscreen all over my face. He plastered sunscreen all the way to my neck, so I frowned around my eyes.
“It’s sticky.”
“Stay still.”
He paid no mind and only backed off after turning even my arms exposed under the sleeves into a sunscreen mess. The feeling of my skin slipping every time I moved was unpleasant and felt like I’d malfunction. When I hesitated because I didn’t like the feeling when my arms touched as I bent them, Won Dogyeong giggled and took a video.
Outside, the sun was peeking its face out between the clouds, but the air still smelled like rain. The ground was also a bit wet.
The air was horribly humid. It was humidity that made me realize once again why I hated summer. I already know it well enough, so I’d like to stop realizing it.
Deciding to come out late in the afternoon was a great choice a hundred times over. If the temperature had been unbearably high too, I might have said let’s go back in as soon as we came out.
Won Dogyeong seemed unbothered since he was strong against heat. I don’t know why he brought it, but he even had a thin hoodie zip-up draped over his arm.
Is he planning to wear that in this weather?
This guy has a blessed constitution, so he doesn’t sweat much either. I’m always panting, drooping like a wet dishrag.
“How do you not sweat?”
“I’m hot too.”
“You don’t really look it.”
I shuddered with envy looking at his fresh and clean face. I felt a bit better when I stretched the neck part of my t-shirt and used the small fan I was holding to get some air.
Originally we were going to go to a cafe famous for shaved ice that was a bit far away, but as soon as we came out, I lost energy and changed our destination to a franchise 5 minutes away on foot.
I just trudged along without the energy to speak until we arrived.
When we opened the shop door with a jingling bell sound, air conditioning wind that made you wonder if only this place had a different season greeted us. It seemed like someone who had never once in their life heard the term global warming had set the air conditioner temperature.
It was an extreme temperature change. Are they trying to turn me into dried pollack?
I ordered melon shaved ice at the kiosk and went to sit in a corner seat.
“It’s almost 5 o’clock already.”
“Should we buy dinner on the way back?”
Without needing to think, what I wanted to eat flashed to mind.
“Toast!”
“The one on the first floor here?”
“Yeah.”
“No matter how many times I see you having so many things you want to eat, it’s always amazing.”
I find myself amazing too.
I now understand too well what people meant when they said the menu you want to eat comes down like a revelation.
By the time I’m falling asleep the night before, a list of foods I want to eat stretches out all the way to the next day’s dinner. There are so many things I want to eat that when I open my eyes in the morning, that list has changed drastically again. My stomach empties quickly and my mouth keeps feeling bored.
