Like this, the two tore each other down, even dragging in the people the other liked (or mistakenly thought they liked) to criticize and make personal attacks. It was a childish argument where no superiority could be determined, but it was Hakyoung who exploded first. Especially, he couldn’t stand the moment Yumyeong brought up ‘Lee Sunmin.’
“Why are you bringing up Lee Sunmin here?”
“Don’t you want to sleep with him in the end too?”
“No.”
“No matter how much you go on about crystals of love, in the end you too…….”
“Stop it. Mind your own business about what I do with whoever.”
When Hakyoung spat out coldly, the atmosphere instantly cooled. Even Yumyeong, who had been half-joking and sarcastic, sensed something unusual and immediately stopped his attack.
“……What. Are you sulking?”
Hakyoung kept his head down and stared at the floor as if to bore a hole through it.
Right now, his heart was brimming as if it would overflow with just one drop of water. He was in such a state of lost composure that he felt choked up at Yumyeong’s words calling this sulking when he was being serious. He hated Yumyeong for scratching at him without knowing what was inside people’s hearts, and he also hated himself for losing his original self and easily becoming emotional when he was with him.
This wasn’t what he intended to talk about.
While Hakyoung was calming down emotions he didn’t know were anger or what.
Suddenly Yumyeong stretched out his long legs.
“Hey.”
Then he tapped the side of Hakyoung’s sneakers with the toe of his sneakers. Hakyoung didn’t respond.
“I’m sorry. You really hate joking around using Sunmin?”
“…….”
“Tsk, I got it. Just like a pure-hearted guy. I’m sorry. From now on, I won’t drag others in and will only tease you.”
“…….”
When there was still no response, Yumyeong subtly sidled up next to Hakyoung.
“Got it. Then I won’t tease you either.”
“…….”
“I said I’m sorry…….”
The moment he felt the warm touch of an arm, Hakyoung was startled and tried to escape in disgust, but his eyes met with Yumyeong’s and he was bound to that spot.
The distance was close. Too much so.
It seemed like the first time facing each other’s faces at such a close distance. The moment he became conscious of this, Hakyoung’s body grew hot all the way to the crown of his head. While wanting to immediately distance himself to a safe distance, at the same time he wished this moment would last a little longer.
“Hakyoung.”
“Yeonga.”
The face of the child he had loved so much in childhood overlapped with that face. Hakyoung couldn’t even blink.
The dense lower lashes, the slightly drooping eye shape, the double eyelid with soft folds only on one eye like a symbol of a playboy……. And he could now see up close that the eyes that seemed to sparkle strangely. It was because the eyeballs were always moistly wet as if covered with a thin film of water.
The eyebrows with neat texture and refreshing angle curved roundly.
“You glare at me just for calling your name?”
“When did I…….”
Hakyoung couldn’t finish his words. It wasn’t intentional. His tense throat choked up and his voice stopped coming out midway.
“Are you upset?”
“…….”
“Cute kid.”
Then Yumyeong flicked Hakyoung’s cheek with his finger and suddenly moved away. Hakyoung felt a bit dazed as he covered his cheek. It felt like he’d been had, but he didn’t dislike it.
The remaining laundry time was too short to return to the room, and awkwardly long to just stand around and wait. Thanks to that, the two left the laundry room and decided to wait in the nearby lounge.
The lights were off but the TV was on, and light flowed in from the corridor, creating an appropriately cozy atmosphere.
The two who flopped down on the sofa fixed their gazes on the TV without meaning. A rerun of an overseas soccer game that someone had left on was playing. Neither of them was interested in soccer, so their gazes just followed wherever the ball rolled.
Before long, Hakyoung’s gaze had shifted from the TV to Yumyeong’s profile. Over the facial contours where light and shadow were clearly revealed in the darkness, his cheeks, forehead, and cheekbones shone white.
Without even knowing he was doing so, Yumyeong’s lips slowly opened.
“But actually…… that thing is real.”
“What is.”
“Everything I said in the classroom today. I’ve only done pecks.”
“……Really?”
“I said it’s real.”
Hakyoung stared at Yumyeong intently. At the same time, information began to organize itself in Hakyoung’s mind.
My goodness.
Hakyoung thought to himself.
Corrupted guy, canceled.
Idiot, canceled.
Promiscuous guy, canceled.
“I was just acting tough earlier.”
Then Yumyeong sighed deeply as if relieved on his own.
“So will you stop looking at me like I’m shameless?”
“Me?”
“You keep looking at me like that.”
Yumyeong pursed his lips.
“Then…….”
“Hm?”
“Was the one you dated when you were young your first and last?”
“Yeah. You could say that…….”
Yumyeong awkwardly brushed his hair back.
“I mean, but everyone says things. What kind of dating is it when you dated as a baby. When I tell them, everyone just dismisses it and doesn’t even count it as experience. Everyone says they had a girlfriend in kindergarten too…… and tells me to leave it out, making a huge fuss.”
“Who says that?”
Hakyoung slightly frowned, displeased with others who touched his precious memories.
“Everyone does. They’re so fucking strict. Since they haven’t done it, they’re all making a fuss trying to drag me down to the same solo status.”
Watching Yumyeong grumble, a smile gradually bloomed on Hakyoung’s lips.
“Are you laughing at me too?”
“No.”
He shook his head, but Yumyeong seemed unconvinced. Toward him who was staring this way with suspicious eyes, Hakyoung opened his mouth.
“I believe you.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. And making it like it never happened isn’t courteous to the other person.”
“Well, as for courtesy…… that kid might have forgotten.”
At the unexpected words, Hakyoung flinched.
“Why?”
“Because everything ended ambiguously at the end…….”
Yumyeong’s expression as he said that was dark. His heart ached at that expressionless face recalling the person he parted with without even exchanging a single goodbye.
“They wouldn’t have forgotten.”
“I don’t know.”
Yumyeong slowly rubbed the sofa with his hand and shook his head. The light and noise from the TV screen scattered faintly over that face.
“Not even one contact came. Just…… forgot about it.”
“Yumyeong.”
“Hm?”
When he called that name he had wanted to call since childhood, Yumyeong raised his eyes as if the address was unfamiliar. Their eyes met with irises that shone even in the darkness.
“If you had a chance to meet again, what would you do?”
He finally asked.
Hakyoung waited for an answer with a strangely nervous heart.
“It’d be nice to see them.”
But Yumyeong’s answer was very simple. Feeling anxious for some reason at that reaction, Hakyoung asked again.
“You’d be satisfied just seeing them?”
“Well, how far should I go?”
Yumyeong chuckled. Hakyoung couldn’t even blink. It wasn’t that he didn’t understand that reaction. Unlike childhood, the issue between man and man was something that had to be overcome again.
“Would they even meet me…….”
“…….”
“She was really incredibly pretty. She’d be even prettier now. Honestly speaking, I still haven’t seen a girl prettier than her.”
“Girl……?”
His breath caught.
Hakyoung froze like ice.
“Yeah. She was the prettiest person I know. Especially when tears dripped from those big eyes, I didn’t know what to do at all. Her crying was so pretty, but I didn’t want to see it. I remember trying everything to somehow stop the tears. That’s why I still can’t stand hearing others cry. My heart gets all fluttery.”
“…….”
“Now that I think about it, I’m curious. She definitely must have become an incredible beauty.”
“Beau, ty…….”
“She was like a princess even then, so of course she’d be a beauty now. It wouldn’t be strange if a kid like that had incredibly high standards. It’d also be a bit much to seem like I’m clinging because of a childhood connection…… Well, I have no intention of being clingy now, but I’m purely curious. With that level of beauty, she might have already been cast by an entertainment agency…… What if I discover her on TV in a few years?”
Yumyeong laughed, but Hakyoung couldn’t laugh at all.
Pitifully stiff and frozen, not even knowing what expression he was making, he blankly stared at Yumyeong.
As his mind gradually returned, Hakyoung was seized by the urge to snap ‘Isn’t this guy an idiot?’ at Yumyeong who was laughing heartily. At the same time, his chest felt stuffy as if something had been placed on his heart.
At first, he couldn’t believe it.
Next, an inexplicable sense of disappointment rushed in. The mind that was flabbergasted at how that could be possible mixed with the mind that it could be so when he thought about it, and eventually he began to get angry beyond feeling wronged.
He had even less courage now to tell the truth. What on earth would happen if he told him that the ‘Yeong’ of the past wasn’t a girl but a boy, and that it was even Ryu Hakyoung right before his eyes?
That would be intensely shattering even the beautiful memories that Shin Yumyeong was at least preserving now.
Yumyeong would be shocked. If he learned that ‘Yeong’ was a robust 186-centimeter tall male, he might immediately foam at the mouth and faint. Even Hakyoung, who had seriously continued his worries already knowing that the child he liked was a boy, felt confused after actually facing the grown-up Yumyeong, hadn’t he?
Knowing that the other person was male and that person actually existing before one’s eyes in a male body were completely different stories. If even he was like that, it was obvious that Yumyeong would suffer from tremendous cognitive dissonance.
“Ha, ha…….”
Hakyoung laughed emptily in disbelief. Yumyeong, who was still smiling while immersed in memories of the past, also laughed “hahaha” along without knowing the meaning.
He didn’t even know what he had hated or resented until now. Shin Yumyeong hadn’t forgotten. It wasn’t that he ignored or was trying to tease him either……. He remembered everything.
He just never dreamed in his wildest dreams that Hakyoung was that child from the past.
Because he thought of that kid as a girl even if it killed him.
Hakyoung dropped his head and stopped laughing.
