In an instant, the smile vanished from Hyowoo’s face.
As his friend suddenly stiffened, a flash of regret crossed Woosung’s expression.
Since it had been a while since they’d met, he had tried not to say anything uncomfortable. But in the end, he couldn’t help asking.
In the fall of their senior year, the last time they’d met, Hyowoo had been noticeably more gaunt.
With a dark expression, Hyowoo hesitated before stiffly nodding his head.
“Yeah… I’m okay.”
“…That’s a relief.”
After the brief exchange, a heavy silence flowed between the two.
After a long while, Hyowoo broke the suffocating silence and spoke.
“I’m… sorry.”
“For what?”
“Just… everything… The school thing too…”
His voice trembled faintly.
It was a word he’d barely managed to squeeze out. However, Woosung looked at Hyowoo, who had hung his head, with cold eyes.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. What did the school thing have to do with you?”
At his cold response, Hyowoo couldn’t continue speaking.
He urged himself not to gloss over it and to apologize properly, but the words he wanted to say only circled at the tip of his tongue—his mouth wouldn’t open.
As he watched Hyowoo fall silent with his lips firmly pressed together, Woosung’s gaze grew increasingly displeased.
Just as he was about to snap sharply at him—tap, tap. The sound of someone knocking on the glass was heard.
Without either taking the lead, both turned their heads at the same time.
Beyond the glass wall stood Gyeonwoo. When their eyes met, he grinned and waved his hand playfully before entering the cafe.
“What’s this? Why’s the atmosphere so gloomy?”
Asking if they’d fought after meeting for the first time in a while, Gyeonwoo pulled over a chair from the next table and sat down. As if he’d noticed the heavy air between them, he greeted Woosung in a voice twice as bright as usual as soon as he sat down.
“Woosung Alpha—no, just regular alpha Lee Woosung! Have you been living well? Haven’t caused any trouble?”
“You’re the one who causes trouble. And, isn’t it proper etiquette to apologize for being late first? You rude bastard.”
“Wow~ This bastard, still just as unmannered as ever. You’re gonna get hit if you keep that up, you know?”
“You’re the one who’s still loud and frivolous. Fix that, before you get hit.”
“Your words are still so pretty. Did you eat a rag for lunch? For someone who looks like a scholar, why is your mouth so foul?”
“I only talk like this to you, Ji Gyeonwoo. I can’t speak nicely to you.”
Unlike Hyowoo, who had hesitated, worried, and fretted before reuniting with Woosung, there wasn’t a trace of awkwardness in Gyeonwoo. Woosung also responded prickly to each and every word his friend said.
“Oh, and wait a bit, will you? You couldn’t even wait and ordered without me, how disloyal?”
“You’re late to the meeting time, so why are you chattering so much?”
“Oh my, okay. I’ve committed a mortal sin. Happy now?”
After carelessly tossing out an apology without a hint of remorse, Gyeonwoo grinned at his hyung.
“My dear good hyung~ Buy your cute little brother just one cup of coffee.”
Watching Gyeonwoo cling to Hyowoo’s arm with exaggerated aegyo, Woosung’s expression turned displeased.
“Buy it with your own money, you bastard. Don’t think about emptying your hyung’s pockets.”
“I’m asking my brother to buy me coffee, what business is it of yours?”
“Ji Hyowoo, don’t buy it for him. This bastard’s gonna get spoiled.”
Watching the two snarl at each other from the moment they met, just like when they were young, Hyowoo’s tension gradually eased.
When Gyeonwoo provoked him, Woosung sharply countered, and Hyowoo mediated between the two from the middle. A familiar pattern. It was as if they’d returned to the past.
In the middle of their conversation getting into full swing, a phone rang. It was Hyowoo’s cell phone.
“You got a call?”
“Huh? Oh… yeah.”
Hyowoo’s cheeks flushed faintly as he checked the name on the screen. Gyeonwoo immediately figured out who the call was from.
“Answer it. Don’t worry about us.”
After hesitating briefly, Hyowoo quietly stood up and went outside the cafe, saying he’d take the call.
“What the hell is up with that bastard?”
As soon as the door closed, Woosung spat out.
“What?”
“Why is he so withered and twisted like that? He looks like skin stretched over bones.”
“He may look like that, but he’s gotten a lot better. After that incident… happened, his weight dropped to the 40kg range.”
Wiping away his playfulness, Gyeonwoo let out a sigh. It was an expression that didn’t suit him.
“I’m only saying this now, but back then I was really scared.”
“Of what?”
“That Hyowoo… might die…”
Back then, Hyowoo wasn’t in human form.
With more than half his face and body wrapped in bandages, he lay in the hospital bed with a bloodless, pale face.
No consciousness, not even a small movement. Only an IV line attached to his bloodless arm kept him alive.
He was only breathing, not living. The phrase ‘not dead yet’ suited his condition better.
That pale appearance started to terrify Gyeonwoo at some point. That’s why he checked several times a day whether there was a pulse, whether he was breathing.
He regained consciousness at a basic level, but even after waking up, there was no relief.
Because he’d suffered something more cruel than the beating that tore skin in various places and broke bones, Hyowoo was left completely devastated.
He even showed symptoms of traumatic mutism and couldn’t speak for a while. He refused all communication and couldn’t even swallow food.
The whole family was gripped by the fear that Hyowoo, who had lost the will to live, might make an irreversible choice. And that fear soon became reality. After returning home, if they took their eyes off him for even a moment, he would self-harm and try to end his own life.
When his condition deteriorated beyond control, they had no choice but to forcibly admit him to a closed ward.
While Hyowoo was in the hospital, his parents hastily sold their high-rise apartment and moved to a first-floor apartment in preparation for after his discharge.
In the new house, Hyowoo’s room had nothing but a blanket laid out bare, without a single piece of furniture. All the doors except the front door were removed, and even the wall hooks and shower head were taken away. Not a single sharp object was left. Even plastic forks were all cleared out.
The task of looking after their precarious hyung was taken on in shifts by his parents, his older sister, and Gyeonwoo.
During that time, Gyeonwoo had no college life, no friends. Only Hyowoo.
He commuted from home every day over a long distance, and when classes ended, he rushed straight home. At night, in case Hyowoo might harm himself, Gyeonwoo firmly tied his hand to his hyung’s with rope and slept together.
“Back then, really, I don’t know how I endured with what state of mind…”
As the painful memories surfaced, his head throbbed. Rubbing his temples, Gyeonwoo awkwardly lifted the corners of his mouth.
“Sorry. Meeting after so long and saying weird things.”
He seemed so bright and frank that it appeared he’d easily reveal his true feelings about anything, but Gyeonwoo was just as cautious as Hyowoo.
He absolutely never said things that would burden the other person or give away weaknesses. Yet he’d easily exposed his vulnerable side to Woosung.
It had always been that way. Ever since they were little kids, even while bickering and fighting, Woosung was the only one to whom he revealed his inner thoughts.
“You saying weird things isn’t exactly news.”
A cold response. Depending on the listener, it could be called cold, but he could tell there was concern in his friend’s eyes.
Prickly on the outside but actually deeper and more affectionate than anyone else. That was Lee Woosung.
Watching Woosung quietly gaze at him without saying anything, Gyeonwoo changed the subject.
“More than that, what were you two talking about before I came that made you both so serious?”
“He said he was sorry.”
“For what?”
At the words that it seemed to be about the school thing, Gyeonwoo scratched his head.
“That’s something Hyowoo’s been carrying in his heart all along.”
“I got rejected from the school because I fought. Why is that that bastard’s fault?”
“Because he thinks you fought because of him. That he provided the cause, and because of that, you got rejected from your first-choice school. And besides…”
Gyeonwoo, who had finished the rest of his coffee, continued.
“Let’s be real, does it make sense to get an immediate rejection notice right after being accepted? That damn school of yours was so desperate to cover up Hyowoo’s incident because they were afraid their reputation would get ruined. But how did the university find out you beat up that bastard? That bastard’s father retaliated because you hit his precious son.”
Gyeonwoo was clenching his jaw hard enough that the sound of his teeth grinding could be heard. The anger he’d forcibly suppressed rose up to his throat.
At his friend’s fierce demeanor, Woosung hesitated for a moment. Then finally, he put down his coffee cup and said in a low voice.
“That bastard seems to have come back to Korea.”
“What?”
The most hateful name in the world came from his friend’s mouth.
“…Ahn Subin, he’s in Korea right now.”
