The morning sickness that came to Siwoo stayed for exactly one month before disappearing.
Even lying down all day made him tired, and taking a single shower required great resolve. He would stop mid-shower and sit down on the chair inside the bathroom booth, waiting for his churning stomach to settle, sometimes crying alone. Just how did his mom do this twice?
The fortunate thing was that he could be with Evan. Just like before, in Evan’s embrace he could escape the morning sickness and sleep comfortably, and when he was with him, he could eat at least a little of anything. There were days that were worse and days that were better, but since he was in a state of seasickness anyway and couldn’t feel much change, Siwoo’s life had completely transformed in a short time.
Since the morning sickness got worse when his stomach was empty, he got used to keeping barley tea and biscuits on the bedside table before sleeping.
Whether the doctor and his mom were right that there was no law saying he had to die, or whether he was getting used to this situation, he didn’t know, but he was learning how to survive in his own way.
That day too, Siwoo simultaneously opened his eyes and reached out his arm to look for the barley tea first. Siwoo’s eyes flew wide open as he was about to wet his lips first and eat a biscuit to soothe his churning stomach.
What’s this? What’s going on?
That feeling—like getting off a roller coaster that had knocked his soul out of him and stepping onto solid ground—had significantly decreased. Though it used to take quite a while for Siwoo to sluggishly get up from bed, weak as waterlogged cotton, strangely now the anemia wasn’t rushing over him.
The doctor had provided iron supplements and various nutritional supplements, but Siwoo couldn’t take them properly. Since eating and throwing up was a constant occurrence, Fayden regularly came to give him IV fluids.
“Huh?”
Surprised by the suddenly vanished morning sickness, Siwoo’s hand touched his lower abdomen, which showed no change at all.
“Coco, are you okay…”
Siwoo tried to say no, you should sleep more to the voice coming from behind—Evan’s voice thick with sleep—but faster than that, Evan disappeared from the bed.
And so the morning sickness that left Siwoo went to Evan.
Morning sickness for a golden alpha. At first, he thought it was indigestion, and when the stomach discomfort continued for several days, he considered it a stress-induced gastric ulcer.
Unlike Siwoo who had become perfectly fine, Evan’s nausea and insomnia gradually worsened, and he was eventually pushed by Siwoo’s nagging to get a health checkup and heard an incredible story from Fayden.
The health checkup results showed everything was normal and Evan was in very healthy condition, but since his current symptoms resembled morning sickness, Fayden gave Evan the diagnosis of morning sickness.
Though it was hardly something to call a diagnosis, Evan who received such a diagnosis was now walking through hell.
The morning sickness that started from when he filmed the live with Siwoo, who had improved in condition, showed no signs of easily disappearing and remained with Evan.
* * *
What came to Siwoo simultaneously with the morning sickness subsiding was appetite. As if compensating for not being able to eat properly all that time, eating whatever he wanted to his heart’s content, Siwoo began filming vlogs.
Mostly filming short daily life videos within 10 minutes, after he became able to eat to his heart’s content, he also filmed vlogs of cooking himself. When he filmed while learning how to make mulled wine and egg tarts from the chef working at Evan’s parents’ house, the response was good, so he designated cooking with the chef as one of his vlog items.
Once a week cooking, once a week daily life—filming and editing directly left no time to be bored. Before the marriage, he had worried about what to do with his time while Evan went to the company, but all those worries had become useless.
Just a few weeks ago he had suffered from severe morning sickness, and even now though his condition had improved considerably, he tired more quickly than before pregnancy, so he frequently lay down to rest and took naps regularly, leaving no time to be bored.
And today, to make special dishes for the Lunar New Year, he invited people the fans were curious about to his home.
“What do you mean small house? This is a palace.”
“Who said it’s a small house? It’s a small house by Evanie’s standards, but by my standards it’s a big house. With the interior design and everything, it inevitably got bigger.”
“The smell of roasting sesame seeds is overwhelming, overwhelming… So, is marriage good?”
“If you’re jealous, hyung should date and get married too.”
“No thanks.”
“Always saying no thanks. Think about your age, hyung. You’ll be thirty without ever dating once.”
Siwoo placed cool orange juice in front of Sangjun, who was sitting sprawled on the sofa looking at the garden. Then he approached Hyunsu, who was standing by the window.
“Hyunsu hyung, isn’t it tiring being around Sangjun hyung? He pretends not to be, but he’s actually quite a nag.”
“Hm? I’m fine though?”
“Of course you’re fine if you’re hanging around him. Today when we go live, it’s going to be chaos. Right?”
“Really, I get to do the live with you too?”
“You came all this way, why wouldn’t you?”
Siwoo took his portion of orange juice and sat in the rocking chair next to the fireplace. Then he alternately looked at Sangjun, who was answering Hyunsu’s realistic question about how much a place like this costs with “we couldn’t afford it even if we died and came back to life,” while Hyunsu looked outside.
Both Sangjun and Hyunsu were truly precious people to him. Though it had become something from about 7-8 years ago, the ‘Journey’ filming he did with Hyunsu was a story that Evan and Siwoo brought up whenever they were bored.
In this life too, Hyunsu was an idol and radio host, and they were naturally able to build friendship when Ocean appeared as regular panelists on that program. They were in contact occasionally while each living busy lives, but as Ocean began to walk their separate paths, Sangjun was participating in Hyunsu’s program as the sole regular panelist on the radio broadcast.
Then as Sangjun made songs for Hyunsu, they seemed to have become closer. After working on songs once in England, saying he liked this place, Sangjun frequently came and went to England, so when Siwoo contacted him to film a vlog together, the answer that immediately came back was that he was with Hyunsu.
Then there’s no way I could miss that.
Siwoo invited the two, and having invited them, how could he just let it be? Though it seemed already sufficiently popular, he decided to put them in the vlog as new guests in a vlog that always only featured Evan, Siwoo, Rush, and the chef.
“Of course Sangjun is filming with you. I’ll just watch.”
“How can that be? If you came, you film together. You both know I can’t cook.”
Siwoo looked at the two bickering while drinking orange juice. This side is suspicious too, why.
It was usually easier to notice a third party’s business than one’s own.
In the midst of this, perhaps more comfortable with Sangjun whom he’d seen a few times than with Hyunsu whom he was seeing for the first time, Rush stuck right next to Sangjun even while looking at Hyunsu. Then he pulled Sangjun’s resting hand, urging him to hurry up and pet him, but when Sangjun didn’t catch that signal, Rush was forcibly pushing his head under his hand.
“Sangjun hyung, pet Rush. The kid wants it that badly, how hard is it to touch his head? Is even that too bothersome?”
“I’m a person who finds even breathing bothersome.”
“Now, if you’ve each had a drink, we should start broadcasting.”
“I said I’m not doing it…”
“You see there are three chairs, right? Too late. Please sit down.”
And so with Sangjun and Hyunsu on either side, Siwoo grinned and pressed the button.
“Hello~ This is Siwoo.”
“…Is this live?”
“Yes. It’s live.”
“You’re going live… Hmm. Nimo~”
At Siwoo’s words that it was live, Sangjun looked at Siwoo unable to hide his flustered expression, then quickly arranged his expression and smiled brightly toward the camera. You said you were filming a vlog? But why is it live? Anyway, this was something to discuss later, and for now he had to focus on the broadcast.
“Wow, the chat is really going up fast. I think it’s probably because of this person next to me. Please introduce yourself directly.”
“Hello, I’m Hyunsu. Yes, I’m a member of that group you’re thinking of right now. Siwoo invited me so I came to hang out, but suddenly he said let’s do a live, so I ended up doing this unexpectedly.”
“As Nimo-nim know, Hyunsu hyung and I became close while I was on the radio. Sangjun hyung is closer since he’s been a panelist on Hyunsu hyung’s radio until recently. We’ll talk about that while cooking. What we’re making today is…”
Siwoo said while pulling the food ingredients placed in front toward himself.
“As expected, our Nimo-nim all know without us saying. Siwoo is making dumplings because it’s Lunar New Year. When I’m with the chef, we make steak and stuff like that, but for us, we make things like this.”
Since the chat window was going up too fast after starting the live, Siwoo gave up on watching the chat and pushed the ingredients distributed in front of Sangjun and Hyunsu toward them. Today was closer to Sangjun’s live than Siwoo’s live.
Unlike Chan and Yechan who continuously showed themselves being active, Sangjun only occasionally let people hear news that he was working on songs with various singers, but wasn’t actually revealing himself.
“Look, look. This is my live but everything is related to Sangjun hyung. It’s not me but Sangjun hyung who needs to show himself. But they’re asking why Hyunsu hyung is in England?”
Since it was mainly Sangjun leading and Hyunsu answering, Siwoo deliberately spoke to Hyunsu.
“Ah, I really got a vacation from radio after a long time. I got a 2-week vacation, and suddenly Sangjun called bragging that he bought a house in England and told me to come visit. Since I didn’t have anything particular to do, I came to hang out.”
“Wow, hyungs. This is really sad. During this year-end and New Year season, this hot season of the departing and coming year, what did you two do so depressingly?”
“Why do you think we were depressed?”
Sangjun, who was kneading the tofu in a large glass bowl with gloved hands as Siwoo instructed, asked with a serious expression.
“It must have been so beautiful. You all know, right? Our Sangjun hyung, how should I say it, he’s very… The fans will know, for sure.”
“He is boring though.”
“What am I!”
Instead of Siwoo, who was contemplating what words to use to describe Sangjun who only chose very realistically bone-hitting words, Hyunsu simply defined him.
