It had clearly been a water glass, so he had drunk from it thinking it was water — but when he smelled it, the contents turned out to be soju. With people switching seats constantly, the glasses on the table had gotten jumbled together without their owners, and he had mixed his water glass up with someone else’s. From the circumstances, it seemed like someone had been drinking soju poured into a water glass and left it there, and he had been unlucky enough to drink it.
It’s not like I can spit it back up… It was only about two sips — it should be fine. Surely something this small wouldn’t cause any problems with his body.
What was hurting him right now wasn’t the small amount of alcohol that had gone down his esophagus — it was his leg, which was going numb. He was deep in thought about how to deal with Kim Minji, his expression growing complicated, when Lee Dogyeong happened to catch his eye and came over.
“Why do you look like that?”
“My leg fell asleep.”
“Geez. Want some help?”
“Yeah.”
Thanks to Lee Dogyeong lifting Kim Minji’s head, he was able to carefully slide his leg out from under her. He gently rubbed his calf until the pins-and-needles sensation faded, then managed to get up from his seat.
“I’m going outside to get some air. Keep an eye on Minji for me.”
“Sure, fine.”
It felt wrong to just leave her sleeping there, so he asked — and Lee Dogyeong agreed readily and sat down in his spot. Quite a few people had stepped out for a bit, leaving the seats scattered and empty. Up until a little while ago, Choi Seonho and Kwon Wookyung had been talking — but now neither of them was anywhere to be seen. Did they step out?
He was heading out of the restaurant when the staff member at the register called out to stop him.
“Sir, I’ll return your card.”
It was his dad’s card — the one he’d handed to the staff when they arrived. He’d left it with them in advance, telling them to put everything on it no matter what anyone ordered.
“Have you already processed the payment? There might be more orders coming.”
“No, no. Actor Kwon Wookyung came by a little while ago and said he’d be paying.”
Despite having his cap pulled low, the staff had apparently already recognized him.
“What? I — I specifically asked you to use mine first. Why did you process it on his card?”
He’d intentionally left the card to prevent the others from paying, and now the one who had arrived late had swooped in and taken over the bill — it was absurd.
“Well… he smiled while he was asking, and it was just hard to say no……”
When Haehyeon asked with a disgruntled expression, the staff member trailed off, cheeks flushing.
He smiled? He launched a face attack just to pay for dinner?
They had ordered freely without looking at the prices, so the total would be quite substantial. It was an expensive place and there were a lot of people — it must have come out to several million won. And the person who had barely eaten more than a few pieces of meat had gone and done something nobody asked of him.
The staff member, seeing Haehyeon’s hardened expression, cautiously asked, “Shall I cancel it and reprocess it?”
“No. It’s fine.”
He took back his card and pocketed it. The guy who rarely smiled even in front of friends had apparently gone out of his way to flash a smile at a stranger just to spend his own money — there was no reason to stop that.
He pushed open the restaurant door and stepped outside, and the cold night air greeted him.
He had been indoors in a crowded place the whole time, so he hadn’t realized the temperature outside had dropped this much — the air brushing past his cheeks was exceptionally cold. Rather than snapping him fully alert, it felt more like being swept up in the particular atmosphere of the night streets.
And just then, Kwon Wookyung was standing beneath a streetlamp a little ways off.
Choi Seonho was with him — the two of them were facing each other, having a conversation Haehyeon couldn’t hear. Choi Seonho noticed him and said something to Kwon Wookyung, and the guy who had been half turned away from him turned around and looked at him.
At the same moment, white smoke drifted out from between his lips like a sigh, spreading and dissolving into the air under the glow of the streetlamp. Kwon Wookyung naturally moved his hand behind his back — but a faint wisp of smoke still seeped out past the edge of his coat.
Haehyeon had an instinct that the noir film currently playing would definitely have a scene of Kwon Wookyung smoking. Because if a director saw those features framed by the dim light and smoke on a darkened street, there was no way they wouldn’t put it in the camera lens. Mafia boss, detective, killer — whatever role he was given, it would lend his backstory a convincing weight.
Even just smoking, he looks like a painting.
As if the frames Kwon Wookyung appeared in flowed at a different pace from the rest of time, his every movement registered in fine detail. It was as if, against a backdrop of rapidly shifting scenery, only Kwon Wookyung had been deliberately slowed down.
Inwardly admiring Kwon Wookyung’s aura while making sure none of it showed on his face, Haehyeon walked over to the two of them.
“I saw everything — what are you hiding? Are you two smoking?”
Choi Seonho, standing a couple of steps away, answered smoothly.
“What, are you my mom? Everyone in the fine arts department smokes.”
Whatever they’d been talking about, Choi Seonho looked more at ease than before. Seeing that his face had taken on that warm, flushed tone, it might simply be because he was drunk….
“What about you?”
“Before and after filming, people would offer them to me. I only smoke sometimes when I’m drinking.”
Kwon Wookyung also seemed somewhat drunk. He’d been getting a lot of drinks poured for him by everyone — the muscles in his face had relaxed, and his usually cold expression looked somewhat softer.
“Hmm. Looks like you two made up.”
I guess full-grown adults make up by drinking and smoking together.
Filing away this new piece of knowledge about the adult world, he looked back and forth between the two of them.
“Made up from what. We’d have to fight first to make up.”
Choi Seonho said this with a slight pout, and Kwon Wookyung just shrugged.
“Ah, the cold is sobering me up. I’m going back in for more drinks.”
“Sure, sure.”
Choi Seonho flapped both arms busily and disappeared back into the restaurant. Kwon Wookyung still had his hand behind his back.
“Give me your hand.”
Haehyeon took the hesitating guy’s hand and brought it in front of him. At the tip of the half-burned cigarette, ash that hadn’t been flicked off was hanging on precariously. Haehyeon plucked the cigarette from between Kwon Wookyung’s two fingers and took it. His whole family were non-smokers, so he had genuinely been curious to see his friends smoking.
“Does this taste good?”
The smell alone isn’t great though.
Half-curious, he mimicked Kwon Wookyung and put the filter of the still-lit cigarette to his lips and took a light drag.
“Ugh — mm…!”
The inhaling part went fine — but the smoke entering his airway tickled and stung his respiratory tract, triggering a sneeze. He tried to compose himself and pretend nothing was wrong, but he couldn’t exhale the smoke properly and kept coughing.
He’d wondered if smoking directly might be better than secondhand smoke, but it was equally unpleasant. When he finally couldn’t hold back and turned his head to cough, Kwon Wookyung took the cigarette back.
“You, hah — this is your problem.”
He’d expected to be laughed at for the ridiculous display, but Kwon Wookyung suddenly furrowed his brows in irritation instead. Then he took a long, deep drag until his cheeks hollowed, burning the cigarette down to the filter, irritably flicked off the ash, and stubbed the butt into a tin case. Then, as if he couldn’t contain his anger, he swept his hair back, adjusted his cap, and glared at Haehyeon.
“…What? I’m not allowed to try smoking?”
Every single one of those movements had been laced with temper, making Haehyeon feel as if he’d committed some serious crime. Was losing one drag of a cigarette really that devastating?
Kwon Wookyung let out a deep, heavy sigh at the pushback and pressed his fingers against the corners of his eyes. As if he’d just heard something utterly exhausting.
“Should I buy you a new one?”
“Forget it. What’s the point in talking to you.”
Huh?
“You were having so much fun in there — why did you come out?”
Even the simplest question came out irritable.
“Then why were you glaring at me?”
“What?”
“Like you said, I was having fun — and you kept glaring at me. You think I didn’t notice?”
“……You weren’t even looking at me.”
“Hey. You might not realize it, but you stick out like crazy, okay? You’re the type that catches the eye from a hundred meters away. You’re hard to ignore. You were looking at me with those eyes — how could I not notice?”
The acting teacher had once looked at Kwon Wookyung’s eyes and called them “born actor’s eyes.”
How to put it — wistful, maybe? Without forcefully squinting or raising his voice, there was something about them that captured attention and wouldn’t let it go. He could be staring blankly at an ant crawling on the ground and you’d mistake it for someone desperately yearning for a lost lover. That was probably why he could become a star even living like a recluse.
“You don’t reply to my texts, so why did you come?”
“…Were you waiting?”
“Yeah, I was waiting — cough!“
He broke off mid-sentence and coughed hard.
“Are you cold? Where’s your jacket?”
“Oh, I draped it over Kim Minji and came out without it.”
He’d left his jacket behind, so he was only in a thin knit top.
Kwon Wookyung sighed again and took off the black coat he was wearing.
“Put this on.”
“It’s fine, I’m not that cold. The breeze actually feels refreshing.”
Feeling the cold night air against my skin — how invigorating.
He refused again and again, but Kwon Wookyung went ahead and draped his coat over Haehyeon anyway.
There wasn’t much height difference between them, but Haehyeon was so slender right now that it was roomy.
……It smells nice. The pheromones naturally absorbed into the coat tickled the tip of his nose. Without letting Kwon Wookyung notice, he breathed the scent in deeply.
“You really didn’t have to.”
“Then stop shivering.”
“I wasn’t shivering. I was actually a little warm.”
It was true. Heat had risen to his cheeks — warm enough that they’d feel hot to the touch.
“See.”
Haehyeon pulled Kwon Wookyung’s hand over and placed it against his cheek. Perhaps because Wookyung had been outside for a while, the hand against his cheek was cold.
“Oh, that’s nice and cool.”
That smooth, large hand was holding all the night air he loved so much.
Kwon Wookyung’s fingers flinched as he tried to pull his hand back, so Haehyeon held on and said, “Just stay still for a second.”
“Did you drink?”
“…Do I smell? Is it noticeable?”
“It doesn’t smell, but you seem a little……”
Haehyeon held onto the hand until he’d stolen all of Kwon Wookyung’s coldness with his own body heat, then let go. And then he came clean without resistance.
“Yeah. I wasn’t supposed to, but I accidentally drank a little. It really was an accident.”
“……This is going to drive me crazy.”
