By Zephyria Seo Gyu-won felt his consciousness growing clearer with the rattling noise. The light laughter and the gentle tone suggesting he go out for a bit to cool off were familiar. Even after his consciousness fully returned, his heavy eyelids wouldn’t easily lift.
He was frustrated by only hearing. After the faint footsteps and the sound of the door opening and closing, only someone’s presence remained. He heard the sound of someone sitting down a few steps away. Even though there was clearly someone there, the hospital room was silent as if no one was there.
The moment he finally opened his eyes, all he saw was the white ceiling. He slowly blinked his still-heavy eyelids and moved his pupils. The face of someone he missed filled his blurry vision. He stared out the window with a nonchalant gaze before slowly turning his head towards him. His well-shaped eyebrows arched slightly. His soft chestnut eyes were filled with more annoyance and bother than surprise.
“……”
Still, he tried to keep his eyes open longer. He blinked again, wanting to see Kwon Tae-hee more clearly, even if just a little. Was this perhaps a dream? The nurse and his brother had disappeared, and Kwon Tae-hee had appeared, so it might be.
In fact, he wished this moment was a dream. If it were, he could take off the respirator and stand before him.
Seo Gyu-won wanted Kwon Tae-hee to feel guilty about his suicide attempt. He wanted him to pity him, to realize the depth of his feelings, and to accept him. He never dreamed that the commotion, which started as a show, would turn out like this.
Until the moment he fell, he didn’t really intend to die, but as he got closer to the ground, he was sure he wouldn’t survive. Looking down from the rooftop of the officetel, the ground below was a dizzying distance, and the speed of the fall was much faster than he had imagined.
His eyes, quickly filling with tears, wandered aimlessly. Unresolved emotions surged. Even in a state that was neither dead nor alive, he was filled with lingering feelings for him. But unlike him, Kwon Tae-hee’s eyes were indifferent.
Even when looking at a complete stranger, he wouldn’t be this cold and detached. He was seized by a wretched feeling. Why am I alive? He certainly didn’t want to die, but the moment he met his eyes, he didn’t want to live. As he was caught in those bad feelings, the door smoothly slid open.
The gaze that had been consistently cold melted away like an early spring.
“You’re here?”
“……Yes.”
His sweet gaze was fixed on the small face that nodded shyly, unwilling to look away. His elegantly outstretched hand touched the bangs clumped together with moisture.
“You’re wet.”
“What about Hyung?”
“Same here. I didn’t see anything either.”
Because Kwon Tae-hee was standing at an angle, Seo Jeong-won hadn’t seen him yet. It wasn’t a funny or amusing situation, but there was plenty of laughter in the kind voice. It was different from the politeness he offered out of obligation. Was this what it felt like to sink endlessly? Between Kwon Tae-hee’s indifference and affection, Seo Gyu-won collapsed alone.
He realized that even the last shred of hope that he had wanted to live when he faced Seo Jeong-won had finally scattered away. The gaze that had been desperately burning only for him soon faded away like a candle that had burned out.
Seo Gyu-won’s eyes slowly opened and closed repeatedly, then closed tightly and wouldn’t open again. He fell back into a sleep with no promise of waking.
That night, Seo Gyu-won’s condition suddenly worsened. It was the same after he was moved from the hospital room to the intensive care unit. Rather, it only got worse day by day. On the third day, the hospital said there was nothing more they could do. They couldn’t even rely on Kwon Tae-hee’s Pheromone. It was because Seo Gyu-won was too weak.
“It’s been three hours. Even if we make his heart beat with CPR, it quickly stops again. His potassium levels in his blood are also… high. You have to decide now.”
“Still, can’t you do it a little longer? Maybe, maybe if you do it a little longer, he might wake up. Please… save him. Please save him, doctor. You said he was okay. You said he was getting better…”
“We are also looking for the reason why he deteriorated so rapidly… I’m sorry.”
The doctor in charge felt puzzled by Seo Gyu-won’s rapidly worsening condition, but bowed his head as if he was sorry to deliver these words. Seo Jeong-won’s eyes were completely wet. He couldn’t even wipe away the tears that were falling down his cheeks, and he gathered his trembling hands in front of his chest.
“Back then, you said that if he woke up… it would be like he could live. You said it was a special case, sob, you said that. That everything would be alright, sniff, that, that all he needed was Pheromone. That Hyung… was hope. You said he would be hope, sob, you said that.”
“I have nothing more to say. I’m sorry.”
He apologized now for his recklessness back then. Seo Jeong-won blinked as if he was shocked. It was the moment he was muttering that it couldn’t be and begging to save him. Beeeee— The sound from the electrocardiogram machine pierced the ears of everyone in the hospital room.
The doctor, who had been standing in front of Seo Jeong-won like a sinner, turned around and jumped onto the bed. He placed his hands on top of each other on the thin chest and compressed Seo Gyu-won’s chest. One, two, three, four. The noisy machine sounds and the doctor’s voice were mixed together. The graph on the monitor still drew a straight line.
Seo Gyu-won’s heart stopped.
The CPR that had been going on for hours also stopped in the end. At the same time as the doctor’s declaration of death, Seo Jeong-won lost his mind.
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Kwon Tae-hee sat by the bed, looking at the palely pale face. Seo Jeong-won couldn’t overcome the shock and fainted. Just before his eyelids heavily lowered, the resentful gaze that had been directed at him lingered in his mind like an afterimage.
He felt like he had given him everything he wanted, but he couldn’t understand why he had looked at him that way. He couldn’t help but sigh repeatedly. How many hours had passed since he had controlled his rising and falling emotions and stayed by Seo Jeong-won’s side? The eyelids that had been neatly closed trembled and slowly opened.
The cloudy eyes, as if wandering in a dream, groped through the air. Seo Jeong-won, who had been looking up at the ceiling, turned his head and looked at Kwon Tae-hee.
“Jeong-won.”
“……Hyung is.”
The scratchy voice flowed out like a sigh. The dry eyes soon became moist. Kwon Tae-hee took a long breath and reached out his hand. As if refusing the action of wiping away the moisture, Seo Jeong-won turned his head away.
“He’s been placed in the morgue. How would you like the funeral to be held?”
“Is he really… dead?”
“Jeong-won.”
At the voice calling him quietly, Seo Jeong-won shed tears. He thought that death was no longer a word that had anything to do with him. When he found Hyung again, he thought that he would soon wake up and recover, and that he would return with him.
He was definitely getting better, he had miraculously woken up. He couldn’t understand Hyung’s death. Seo Jeong-won bit his lip. The doctor in charge also said that he didn’t know why Hyung had suddenly gotten so bad. If so, could something have happened while I was away?
“I’m sorry that things turned out this way.”
Seo Jeong-won felt a strange chill at Kwon Tae-hee’s calm voice.
“I thought you would need a death certificate, so I got it in advance. For the funeral, whether it’s Seonam or Seoul, if you let me know the area you want, I’ll look into the hospital and—”
Kwon Tae-hee was about to say the word ‘corpse’ without realizing it, but he quickly shut his mouth at the last moment.
“Jeong-won.”
Tears flowed from his eyes without drying, even though he hadn’t drunk or eaten anything. Kwon Tae-hee reached out his hand again, but Seo Jeong-won strongly pushed it away.
“……You lied to me.”
“……”
“But what’s worse is… I pretended not to know even though I knew everything. Because I thought Executive Director wouldn’t help me if I didn’t.”
The tearful voice continued haltingly. Every time he blinked, the heavily formed moisture on his wet eyelashes flowed down. Even in this moment, he was pretty, so Kwon Tae-hee was just dumbfounded.
“I heard everything, but I endured it because of the money.”
“Seo Jeong-won.”
“I feel like I’m going to die every time I see Hyung’s face, but I couldn’t go back to the time when I was handling it alone without getting help. Sob, sob. I’m so terrible and dirty.”
Seo Jeong-won, who had buried his face in his pale hand and was crying while shaking his whole body, suddenly raised his head. He moved his lips, which had turned white, and barely made a sound.
“When you were alone with Hyung… did you really, really not do anything… to Hyung?”
“Ha.”
“The doctor said so too. That there’s no reason for him to suddenly, sob, suddenly get this bad. But… I was with Executive Director. Sob, sniff.”
“Ah, so what Jeong-won is saying is that Seo Gyu-won died because of me.”