“I waited to eat together.”
When I went to MT and stuff, you ate just fine alone!
Kwon Yunsu, who was about to retort, just sat down at the gaze holding a fork and knife and staring up at him. Really eating this? It’s past 1 AM now? Beyond his dubious gaze, Lee Euishin began cutting the meat. In a dumbfounded state, Kwon Yunsu also took a bite of bread. The bread he’d thought would be cold and crumbly wasn’t warm but was soft enough. Lee Euishin poured him wine. It was his first time having wine. Afraid the glass might break, he carefully held it and took a sip—it tasted bitter, sour, and intoxicating, a billion light years away from grape juice. Thinking it was higher difficulty than pork cutlet, while cutting the meat, Lee Euishin served him salad. The guy who would normally nag with all sorts of things like ‘eat up,’ ‘take it with your own hands,’ was unusually silent. Was it because it was late at night? …What are we doing at dawn? He suddenly felt like laughing. Living with Lee Euishin, all kinds of things happen.
“Who told you to protest this cutely?”
The words he cheerfully offered were ignored. Kwon Yunsu didn’t yield and opened his mouth again.
“When I start my part-time job, you’ll have to eat alone every day.”
Lee Euishin raised his head. At the sharply glaring gaze, Kwon Yunsu quickly added.
“On days school ends early, I’ll set it up in advance before I go. Heat up the soup and just scoop the rice. Don’t think I’ll neglect my duties, Lee Euishin. I’m someone who lives with the boarder contract posted on the wall.”
“You’re getting a part-time job?”
“I have to find one. I don’t have money. First, I’m going to borrow from noona to buy the plane ticket. Noona saves money well.”
Kwon Yunsu watched with slight tension as Lee Euishin slowly drank his wine. Is that wine glass going to fly at me now?
“You want to go that badly?”
His face truly showed he couldn’t understand, so Kwon Yunsu made the same face.
“Are you disrespecting my love for soccer?”
Lee Euishin, who’d lowered his gaze, slowly cut his meat. While his gaze was unconsciously stolen by the gracefully extended fingers’ movement, the guy asked again.
“…Do you want to go with me?”
“Yeah.”
He answered right away. I was the one who suggested we go together, wasn’t I? Looking at Lee Euishin asking the obvious with a frustrated feeling, at some point Kwon Yunsu got hit in the head with a ding and his cheeks reddened.
Do you want to go with me? When he overlaid those words with the elegant dining table, the low voice, and the guy’s gaze that threw a fastball without hesitation, his mood became strange. What is it, keep attacking strangely. Embarrassed, Kwon Yunsu raised his voice.
“No, if you don’t want to go, then don’t go by yourself, why trip up my legs? I’m definitely going. I’m going to see our hyungs to my heart’s content, so you just guard the house like a landlord should.”
“I’ll go.”
“Yeah yeah, don’t go and do whatever you… Huh?”
“I’ll do the water balloon thing or whatever the hell too.”
When he looked in surprise, Lee Euishin was the same as usual—cool and arrogant. On top of that, frowning slightly,
“Really?”
“……”
Down to not opening his mouth again for something he’d already answered once, it was Lee Euishin when he reluctantly agreed to his request.
Why? In a dumbfounded state, Kwon Yunsu ate the meat.
Why did he suddenly change his mind? It hasn’t even been a day since he made that scene in front of the kids. Forgetting that dawn was deepening, he also ate bread and ate the salad with salmon. Even if it wasn’t spectacular, it was all delicious. The table setting was pretty enough to feel sorry for only noticing now. He regretted not being able to watch Lee Euishin prepare all this.
…Why is he trying to go? Ambiguous worries with no answer, the feeling of indigestion, the thoughts that had occasionally crossed his mind lately all swirled in his head at once. The seat he was sitting in felt awkward, as if itchy from his toes up.
“Are you done eating?”
At the sudden sound, he looked down to see the plate completely empty. Before he could answer, Lee Euishin cleared the table and took the dishes away.
“Hey, I’ll do the dish—”
And he came back, picking up the wine glass Kwon Yunsu had taken one sip from and left behind.
“I don’t want to trust expensive dishes to your hands, so go digest your food.”
He’s not the type to eat what others leave behind.
Lee Euishin reached out. A cold touch wrapped around the back of his head and the nape of his neck. In an instant, the fork that had been in his hand was swiftly pulled away.
“Ask me a question.”
And another command. He was reminded of that dawn when they had driven from Incheon just as spring was arriving.
“Why did you change your mind?”
Why? …If he asked that, and if an answer came back, what would change? …Would there be some clue to this ambiguous problem with no answer?
Lee Euishin gave an answer without Kwon Yunsu’s question.
“You said you wanted to go together.”
And leisurely drinking his wine, he turned his back.
As if entranced, Kwon Yunsu left the kitchen and sat on the living room sofa. …Who the hell is he? He didn’t understand Lee Euishin. Everything he’d known until now—that his personality was incredibly difficult, that he was as sensitive as a princess, that his mouth was rough, that he hated all social interaction in the world…. Consistently a bad-tempered middle school, no, high school classmate. With his appearance that intimidated people in many ways, he was extremely difficult to handle. At any rate, he had been impressively consistent.
But now he’d be irritable like cooking porridge, then suddenly become sweetly generous and completely captivate him. His mind went blank, his heart sank—it was total chaos.
Why is he acting like this? He placed his hand on his full stomach and looked up at the ceiling. His stomach, no, his heart was pounding.
He felt like something frightening would happen if he found a clue to the answer.
“……”
It was strangely quiet. After finishing up in the kitchen and coming out, Kwon Yunsu was sprawled on the sofa, asleep. Still in his clothes, without washing his face or brushing his teeth. Tsk, clicking his tongue, he bent down in front of him. With a face laden with exhaustion, not even fully digested yet, he was sleeping soundly.
“That’s what you get for doing part-time work…”
He looked closely at the guy’s hands that were outside the sofa. Seeing him go out and do dishwashing left a bitter taste in his mouth. He was the type who didn’t carry hand cream or anything originally, so his hands were rough. He pressed his lips to the palm while gazing at the peacefully closed eyes, and caught the savory smell of bread. A child who eats hard and sleeps hard.
“Stop wandering around.”
He returned the hand and this time stroked his head. Softly rippling hair. Kwon Yunsu has a pretty forehead. Always well-washed thanks to his sister’s strict upbringing, the guy always smelled good. His nose tickled at the faint body scent.
“I could break your legs and confine you at home.”
He wanted to kiss his cheek too, but refrained in case his hands went further. The more lewd stuff, the lewdest stuff, should be done when sober.
“You want to go together? …If it’s not just the two of us going…”
Covering the sleeping Kwon Yunsu’s body with a blanket and turning off the living room light, Lee Euishin muttered one last time.
“…Let’s just not go together.”
***
“Song Taesu, your arms and legs are different colors there. Are you a mutant?”
“You’re the only one who cares about that stuff.”
“What? Hyung, look at this guy, does it make sense for his arms and legs to be different colors? With such a lax attitude, what money do you expect to make?”
“…But it seems better than this side…”
“This side?”
Where Lee Eunsub pointed apologetically and Ahn Shinwook sharply turned his head, there was Kwon Yunsu. Kwon Yunsu, painting over an Iron Man suit with pink, had an endlessly serious face. They’d said they’d just bring last year’s and touch up the colors, but here and there new creative venues were opening up.
“Wait a minute. Don’t say anything. I’m concentrating. Really…”
Kwon Yunsu, painting Iron Man’s chest, was even trembling in his hands. Truly unnecessary artistic passion.
Ahn Shinwook shook his head and turned his eyes to the promotional flyer he’d been working on. The promotional flyers to be posted on and off campus were being made by hand, one by one. They needed to stand out and also save money. Next to him, Kim Younghwan and Shin Jaewoo were doing the same work, and Lee Euishin, excluded from labor in exchange for having his face plastered on the flyer, was looking at the back of Kwon Yunsu’s head with an indifferent face as if seeing all sorts of strange sights.
…Again. That guy is always doing that. Doesn’t it look like that to other people’s eyes? Ahn Shinwook shook his head as if dispelling something impure. He wished those two threats to peaceful club life would hurry up and disappear. But without that pair of storm eyes, there would be no hope for the joint budget either, right? They weren’t short on money, but for these members to travel together, they absolutely needed that damn joint budget. In that sense, Lee Euishin changing his mind was very fortunate. To make money with this group without investment, there was nothing more certain than Song Taesu’s proposed “selling Lee Euishin’s face.”
‘I’ll do it.’
When Lee Euishin said that,
‘What?’
‘Quitting?’
‘Going to Europe?’
‘Water balloons?’
With their respective expectations, questions burst out here and there, and it was Kwon Yunsu who tidily organized them all.
‘Both me and him will participate in the booth and go to Europe. Right, Euishin-ah?’
