7 – Tit for Tat (6)

Chapter 5

The next day, Hae-won failed to say goodbye to the people he was grateful for. The day after that, he didn’t take the bus. Even the day after that, he did nothing but make resolutions while buried in his warm bedding.

As the transitional season—where the heat persisted during the day and turned sharply chilly as night fell—shifted into a more stable climate, the primary reason he couldn’t leave was Seo Hae-young. Whenever Hae-won brought out his slippers, they would frequently end up perched on top of the wall before he knew it, and since Hae-young clung to his side from sunrise to sunset without leaving him for a single moment, Hae-won, who had never been one to scheme, couldn’t devise a plausible plan.

As days continued to pass, spent idling with games on the phone Seo Hae-young pressed into his hand or watching a low-resolution television, his will to escape slowly eroded. Just as he had tolerated Seo Hae-young’s attitude, telling himself, ‘This much is okay, these things are fine,’ he had unconsciously become soaked in the season’s kindness.

Of course, he wasn’t playing along in some ridiculous roleplay. He was simply letting himself be swept away, like someone who had let go of their grip upon facing a powerful current. Because that alone was exhausting enough, he had no will to make other plans.

“The kid is so dim, he’s going to have a hard time…”

“He is kind, though.”

A large hand rubbed the back of his head. His upper body swayed, and the alcohol in the paper cup sloshed along with him. Seo Hae-young’s hand, treating him like a deficient younger brother, tickled the nape of his neck and slid down to his waist. Hae-won couldn’t bring himself to push away the hand that boldly embraced his waist, and instead turned his gaze toward the sea where chilly waves were crashing. Even with the vast expanse of nature before his eyes, the feeling of suffocation would not fade.

It had been roughly an hour since he was dragged out by Seo Hae-young, who claimed they should go for a walk since they were bored. Had they not been caught by the local elderly men who were knocking back soju from midday on a wooden platform overlooking the sea, it would have been more than enough time to return. The strange drinking session began when Seo Hae-young—whom one of the old men, who had set up a small gambling ring with crates of soju, assumed would naturally refuse—readily accepted a glass offered to him.

Unable to voice an opinion, Hae-won had no choice but to be pushed along once again by the impulsive Seo Hae-young. Being trapped alone in a cramped space thick with subtle tension was an ordeal, but mingling with people who were not particularly friendly was equally grueling.

“Tsk, he doesn’t say a word, so I can’t tell if he’s kind or not…”

“He really is.”

“Whatever. Here, just take it.”

Mr. Kim, who was being contrarian, held out a soju bottle, and Seo Hae-young, responding without formality, held out a paper cup to receive the drink. Hae-won glanced at Mr. Kim, whose face was flushed red, and then cast his eyes down. He felt a sigh about to burst from his chest.

The elderly men, with their failing eyesight, couldn’t distinguish the difference in their appearances. Here in Anbyeok-ri, Seo Hae-young had suddenly become the devoted older brother who had suffered immensely searching for his physically and mentally frail younger brother, and after a dramatic reunion, was now staying with him to help him recuperate. Gi-tae, the youngest among them, had witnessed the chaos but wasn’t the type to speak up, and while the sharp-eyed lady at the supermarket had openly mentioned they didn’t look alike, it ended with the sentiment that it was nice to see two young people wandering around a village full of old folks. Things were proceeding exactly as he had feared. Trapped in a place where no one knew their past, the agonizing days of the past were beginning to feel distantly far away.

“Eh, what about the brother?”

One of the old men, who had taken the bottle from Mr. Kim, poked his green-tinted nose toward him. Hae-won, who hadn’t emptied a single glass while Seo Hae-young’s glass had been emptied several times, hurriedly downed the remainder in one gulp. The astringent and bitter scent made him frown.

At that moment, a piece of snack popped into his parted lips. Without even glancing at him, Seo Hae-young, who had fed him the snack, naturally leaned his head against Hae-won’s shoulder. It was an excessively intimate gesture, but the old men huddled together over their drinks didn’t nitpick about why they were so close. Hae-won was the only one tense and scanning the room.

While the old man poured another drink, Hae-won blinked a few times to focus his vision and exhaled. Since he hadn’t touched alcohol for a while, his head spun as he downed the soju filled to the brim of the paper cup in one go.

“Drink in moderation.”

Soft hair brushed gently against the nape of his neck. As the clear liquor filled the cup and the surface rose, he remembered the old days. The days when he drank desperately because he was terrified of being sober, and Seo Hae-young, who had gone beyond mere bystanders to actually encourage it. There were too many unresolved things to willingly accept the sensation of a forgettable past fading away.

“Ah.”

Seo Hae-young, now giving him no time at all to sink into thought, picked up a piece of sashimi and brought it to his lips. Hae-won obediently ate it, moving his jaw. As the alcohol began to take hold, the squishy sensation of chewing gradually dulled.

By the time the paper cup had grown soggy and he had lost track of how many glasses he’d emptied, Seo Hae-young was drawn into the leisurely gambling game. The moment Seo Hae-young received the Hwatu cards and pulled cash from his wallet, the gathering became boisterous. Hae-won, lacking the confidence to join in, watched from a distance. Loud laughter erupted, though he couldn’t tell who it was coming from.

“It’s not like we’re professional gamblers, just bet a little!”

Mr. Kim, gesturing to Seo Hae-young who had placed bills next to his right knee, took a thousand-won note and tossed it into a corner. The way he used to act crookedly and pick fights over every little thing was gone. Mr. Kim seemed to genuinely like Seo Hae-young, and he certainly wasn’t the only one.

Although they had paid a fee to officially move in, the kindness and interest shown by the villagers were excessive. Even some of the elderly who had previously kept a wall up and looked at him with discomfort now acted friendly toward Seo Hae-young, as if he were their own grandson. It wasn’t that Seo Hae-young had gone from house to house acting sweet; that wasn’t it. He had simply, for no reason, permeated into the community as he always did.

“He’s good at this. I’m not.”

“Really? You don’t look like you’ve got a lick of skill… Do it together, together.”

Then, he shared the ground he had gained without much effort. So that Hae-won could squeeze into the solid group, so that he could feel a sense of belonging, even if it was one that would vanish by tomorrow. That was how he met Go Tae-gyeom, Joo Hyun-woo, Joo Hyun-jeong, and Seo Ga-young. Seo Hae-young could give him everything, and then take it all away at any moment.

When Hae-won didn’t take the Hwatu cards offered with a “Here,” Seo Hae-young forced them into his hand. The colorful pictures printed on the cards blurred and tangled. It was because he had drunk too much.

“You have to win.”

Seo Hae-young, resting his chin on Hae-won’s shoulder, whispered with his lips pressed against his ear. Despite having lost a round miserably and had his stakes taken, Seo Hae-young, who calmly whispered for him to play this card, didn’t seem to know the rules very well. The warm breath brushing against his earlobe was so chilling that his fingertips trembled.

He squeezed his eyes shut and opened them, trying to regain his senses, but it wasn’t easy. Mr. Kim urging him to flip the card quickly, the old men laughing loudly, the stakes being taken away one by one, and the low voice delivered directly and unavoidably—it all left him completely dazed. Wrinkled hands moved quickly, bright red cards were shuffled, and Seo Hae-young’s wallet emptied. Just following the chaotic game was overwhelming.

By the time he could no longer feel the gaze of Seo Hae-young, who was drinking with an old man not participating in the gamble, the man who had won the most money gave a fond scolding: “What do you mean you’re good at this!” The sound of clicking the tongue contained more amusement than pity. The wrinkled face of the old man hurriedly gathering the stakes in the corner was full of smiles. Hae-won stared blankly at Mr. Kim, who sighed about how the man loved money, and the old man, who pretended not to hear while meticulously stuffing the money into his pocket, and suddenly, a laugh escaped from between Hae-won’s teeth.

“He’s so happy after taking all his Hyung’s money…”

Even Mr. Kim’s glare didn’t feel particularly hostile. It was strange. However, the laughter that had been popping out with a hint of shyness dried up without a trace the moment his eyes met Seo Hae-young’s, who was staring at him with his chin resting on his hand. Hae-won quickly pulled down his stiff lips, checked the room, and downed the remaining soju in the paper cup. The scent of Seo Hae-young, carried by the sea breeze, was overpowering. His stomach churned.

As the tipsy old men returned home one by one, the long walk came to an end. His feet dragged on the ground, and his pace slowed. He hadn’t even had time to count how many bottles he’d emptied because he couldn’t refuse the old man who kept filling his empty glass. If not for the hand supporting him, he was so exhausted he might have fallen asleep with his head pressed against a telephone pole.

Barely making it to the wooden porch, Hae-won flopped down and stared blankly at the spinning ceiling. Looking at the regularly spaced rafters seemed to make the alcohol hit him even harder. Seo Hae-young, who had drunk twice as much as he had, didn’t look any different.

“I’m dizzy.”

As Seo Hae-young, lying beside him and staring at the same ceiling, tickled his palm with a finger, a cool breeze smelling of salt dried his lips. A hot heat spread from where their shoulders lightly rubbed.

It felt like the old days when he lived with vain dreams. A time when a sense of intimacy greater than awkwardness filled the void, even without a single word of conversation. As the time he could never return to came to mind, he suddenly felt as if he wouldn’t be punished no matter what he asked.

Since coming here, they had never had a proper conversation. In truth, he no longer knew what he wanted, and he decided not to harbor curiosity about why things were like this. He wanted to let things flow as they were, but just… today, he felt like asking. Licking his dry lips with his tongue, Hae-won hesitated before speaking in a small voice.

“Why are you pretending to be kind?”

“Hmm?”

“Do it… do it like before.”

The finger that had been gently scratching his palm moved up to his wrist. The contact stopped right there.

“I’m doing it like before right now.”

“…You weren’t.”

The ‘before’ Seo Hae-young spoke of was the ten years they spent together. And the ‘before’ Hae-won spoke of was the last three years that had crushed those ten years with rape and violence. These were things that wouldn’t be resolved even if Seo Hae-young begged while crying, and times that wouldn’t be forgotten even if they lived apart and never saw each other again. Whether he couldn’t forget the disastrous days or couldn’t forget Seo Hae-young, he didn’t know… Hae-won lifted his limp arm and placed it over his eyes.

“To do this… this is why I live here. Just, to make… make it all forgotten.”

Everything would go as Seo Hae-young wanted. A sense of crisis chased him right up to the back of his neck. To avoid being completely swept away, the right thing would be to run away immediately, but his legs, heavy with alcohol, wouldn’t budge. It felt as if he were exhausted from running.

While he remained motionless, he felt the wooden porch creak as someone shifted their weight. The hand bracing the headboard, the knee sliding between his legs—the warmth he had become accustomed to from being constantly close moved in. When he removed the arm covering his eyes, he couldn’t see Seo Hae-young’s face clearly as he climbed on top. They were so close that their noses almost touched, making his focus blurry. Naturally, he couldn’t see the expression Seo Hae-young was wearing. So, he listened with his only ear to the lips that opened as if to give an answer.

“I’m just begging.”

Though his eyes were open, the distance where he couldn’t see made the lie not feel like a lie. Perhaps he was so drunk that he heard what he wanted to hear. As he blinked his hazy eyes, the lips that had only been brushing against him slowly descended. The kiss, which had evaporated for a week, two weeks… or perhaps a much longer time, was cautious, as if asking for permission. A kiss that wasn’t like Seo Hae-young, and therefore not frightening, made his head spin.

The porch he lay on flipped back and forth like a ship encountering a storm. In the alcoholic haze where even keeping his eyes open was a struggle, his judgment gradually blurred. In the late afternoon before the sun had set, anyone passing by the path could have witnessed this scene over the low wall. How quite a sight it must be for those called brothers to cling to each other and kiss… he knew it well, but he couldn’t bring himself to push him away.

The way his firmly closed lips slowly parted was not a sign of forgiveness. The tongue, interpreting this as it pleased, pushed into the deep gap as if it had been waiting, filling his mouth. He pushed his tongue out to repel it, but without much effect, it only rubbed and tangled wetly with the invading tongue. The helplessness and haziness brought on by the alcohol sweetly accepted the contact that should have been rejected.

“…Haa.”

They pulled apart slightly, then tilted their heads to clash lips again, this time interlocking more deeply. Every time the tongue swept the roof of his mouth and entered deep, his limp arms trembled. The terror he had experienced in the hospital ward, where he felt as if his breath would stop at any moment, did not come. It was all because of the alcohol. He could feel his hand clutching Seo Hae-young’s clothes, and his chin tilting upward as if urging him on every time their lips parted, but the guilt was faint.

“Huu…”

Who was it? Right… Go Tae-gyeom. It was similar to the day he first gave his body to that bastard. Unlike now, when autumn was ripening, it had been a very hot summer with an old electric fan rattling away. The face of Tae-gyeom, who had climbed on top and thrust his hips like a madman, was blurry. He couldn’t recall the voice clearly, nor could he remember the moments of hatred. He had spent days, years, laughing face-to-face with a man he could no longer even remember, and just as they had suddenly slept together… there are times when reason simply cannot keep up.

As rationalization, which was easier than resisting, dismantled his reason, he felt as if he had returned to the very beginning. It felt as if he were experiencing the first time with Seo Hae-young, like that summer day when they had clumsily matched their bodies while drunk. He felt no aversion even as a hand slowly entered under his thick knit sweater to stroke his side, and a lower body, where an erection was clearly felt, pressed against his groin. The complacent thought that it would be okay for just a short while turned its back on the sense of crisis.

Every time their lips parted, the location and situation had changed. In a room where the heat was trapped like midsummer because the boiler hadn’t been turned off before leaving, unfolded bedding brushed against his skin. With one blink, he was stark naked, and while accepting the clashing lips once more, a hot hand entered his groin. Instead of conversation, ragged breaths filled the sun-drenched room.

Hae-won let his powerless limbs hang limp and watched the dizzyingly swaying moments as if he were a bystander. Seo Hae-young seemed desperate. He bit and sucked all over, leaving marks, and lips stained redder than those marks pressed against his cheek, but Hae-won had no strength to push him away. A strange sensation followed, where his consciousness drifted far away and then, at some point, reality was recognized. In an ambiguous state—unable to actively accept it, yet not resisting—he lowered his heavy eyelids.

He saw the wrist draped over his thigh, where cigarette burns and scars from self-harm would never disappear. A hand that couldn’t fully grip the leg over the prominent veins of the wrist—only after seeing that hideous hand did an unpleasant foreign sensation surge up from below his waist.

“Hng… ugh…”

There was a sound of flesh sticking and pulling apart. As the fingers rummaging through the hole withdrew and then suddenly slammed back in, his toes, floating in the air, trembled violently. While his nipples, swollen red from being sucked and bitten, were crushed once more, three fingers coated in thick white lotion probed deep inside. Letting out a sharp scream and arching his waist, Hae-won didn’t know what to do with the touch that had no leisure in it, only opening his lips wide. His body, unable to withstand the force of Seo Hae-young pushing the fingers in with all his might, was shoved upward.

“Ah…! Aaah…”

Even though his head hit the wall covered in yellowish wallpaper, the hand thumping against his perineum did not withdraw. The fear that his inner walls would be pulled out entirely and the sensation that had become unfamiliar in the meantime heated his head. Propping himself up with trembling arms and pushing off the hot floor to steady his swaying upper body, Hae-won pushed at Seo Hae-young’s shoulder, who clung closer as he tried to flee, but there was no way he would easily pull away. Fingers that curved and then straightened rubbed the slippery lotion into every bump of the mucous membrane.

“Ugh, hng…”

“Ah, fuck…”

Muttering annoyed curses at the muscles that refused to loosen, Seo Hae-young draped Hae-won’s calf over his shoulder and pulled his waist in tight with one arm. Sliding down, Hae-won leaned the back of his head against the wall, letting out a suppressed groan while exposing his backside in an awkwardly folded position. Fingers worked to widen the space for the penis, moving side to side to stretch the folds to their limit. The hole, clamping tightly around the fingers and leaving no gap to penetrate, flickered open to reveal the inner flesh. The thick, cloudy lotion that had been shoved inside leaked out bit by bit, dripping onto the floor.

“Huu, ngh…!”

When the fingers, stirring wide within the hole, pressed hard against a certain spot, Hae-won’s face flushed red and his shoulders trembled. Seo Hae-young, using a hand sticky with melted lotion, withdrew his penis and stroked the painfully erect shaft upward. A heat that made him want to strip off all his clothes filled his lungs, leaving him breathless.

“Haah…”

He needed to loosen him up a bit more, but for Seo Hae-young, this was his best effort. Or rather, the fact that he had endured this long was a testament to his utmost patience. He couldn’t forget the impulse he’d felt months ago, when he’d caught Hae-won cooling off by splashing water on his limbs at the outdoor tap and wanted to pin him right there and press their bodies together. Hae-won would never know how long it had taken for him to turn away after witnessing that sight.

Letting out a hollow laugh at the sudden memory, Seo Hae-young stroked the leg—covered in scars and without a single clean spot—before pulling him closer. The skin beneath his touch was burning, and his head was dizzy. Whether it was the alcohol or because of Hae-won, he didn’t know, but they were things that didn’t need to be distinguished.

Seo Hae-young spread the thighs of Hae-won, who had slid onto the blanket without resistance, and aligned the glans with the hole. Hae-won’s eyes were open, but his gaze was hazy, unable to properly perceive what was happening. Seo Hae-young locked eyes with those eyes that couldn’t even see what was in front of them and lowered his hips. The folds, which had been repeatedly contracting as if to swallow the tip, suddenly flared wide. The hole, which had received nothing for the past year, was given no time to adjust.

“Heeuuk—!”

Starting from the pre-cum coated glans, he was quickly sucked inside, swallowed all the way to the base. The rock-hard penis crushed and forced open the unrelaxed inner walls, burying itself deep. The sluggish body, soaked in alcohol, flailed as if struck by a bolt of lightning. His lean back straightened, and his limp legs flopped, pushing away the crumpled blanket. There was no gap between their groins, locked tight at the perineum. In truth, it was no different from forcing his way in. Seo Hae-young, pinning down the upper body that instinctively struggled to escape, exhaled a feverish breath through half-closed eyes.

“Ngh, ah… Yoon Hae-won…”

As the grotesquely warm inner walls tightened without a gap around the penis, a chilling stimulation raced up his spine. He had no luxury to be slow or gentle, neither then nor now. He wrapped his arm around Hae-won’s lagging waist and supported the back of his head, hugging him so he couldn’t move an inch. Even the knees bumping against his side in a struggle were welcome. He pulled his hips back and slammed his penis in with a sound of flesh hitting flesh, and a pained groan struck his ears.

“Huck, a-ugh…! Ack…!”

The penis, forcing open the closed inner flesh, rummaged through his organs. As Hae-won took in Seo Hae-young between his wide-spread legs, droplets of water gathered at the corners of his eyes and fell in succession, while his stiffened arms flailed in the air. As he instinctively hugged the broad back, his consciousness—which had been floating as if detached from his body—settled on the sun-drenched ceiling, clung to the lacquer chest, and finally returned to its place. His hazy eyes, on the verge of closing, snapped open.

“Heeu, uu…!”

The moment he directly felt the thing inside his lower abdomen, which was pulsing and receding, the hair on the back of his neck stood up. As the heavy weight covering his entire body, the familiar scent, and the sound of breathing became recognizable, his limbs began to tremble uncontrollably. Why am I doing this? The moment the question arose, he felt a surge of nausea.

“Ha-eu, ha, stop! Ah…, don’t put it in, I-I don’t… ack!”

As the mucus dripping from the wide-open hole and the sensation of something being shoved between his buttocks became vivid, he snapped awake as if doused in cold water. The moment he had accepted the kiss as if possessed became disgusting, and the brightly spreading sunlight felt stinging. Facing this horrifying mistake, Hae-won struggled, grabbing Seo Hae-young’s top and pushing him back, oblivious to the man continuing to thrust his hips.

“I don’t want to, I don’t… Ah, I won’t…! Huck…! Stop it!”

“Ha-eu…, I don’t want to…”

Seo Hae-young, whose eyes had already gone vacant, whined softly and buried his face in Hae-won’s collarbone. The movement of his hips did not stop. Every time the thick glans slid out and caught on the folds, Hae-won’s breath hitched, and he clenched his teeth until they ached. The blanket beneath them became soaked, and the ceiling with its lattice pattern shook violently. Hae-won gasped for breath, forced to accept the penis that felt as if it were destroying his inner walls.

“Heuuk, aaak…!”

The saliva he swallowed repeatedly boiled up in his throat. His stomach grew hot, and his nipples, rubbing against the thick knit sweater, became itchy. A low moan, the kind that only comes before something terrible, escaped him.

“Stop it… ack! Heuuk, u-ugh…!”

A sensation—neither pleasure nor pain, nor anywhere in between—surged up like an explosion. He loathed his heating body. The feeling that he, of all people, should not be doing this with Seo Hae-young clashed violently with the desire to cover everything and just hold him for a moment. The alcohol acted as a catalyst, leaping between these two opposing winds. He felt as if his head would explode. Gagging and dry-heaving, Hae-won covered his eyes with both palms. The foul pleasure doubled.

“Ah, Hae-won…”

Hae-won’s body jolted violently every time Seo Hae-young thrust upward. His lower abdomen felt hollowed out, and moist sweat seeped from every inch of his skin. Movements more clumsy and rough than when they first had sex poured over him. Hae-won’s penis, unable to achieve a full erection, shook and slapped against his stomach.

“U-ugh…, k-kh…! Heuuk…!”

Truly, it felt as if his head would shatter. As his palms grew damp, a hollow laugh and a sob broke out simultaneously.

Was he so stupid as to be completely fooled by Seo Hae-young pretending to be kind for a few measly months? It was pathetic. It was despairing and disgusting. Seo Hae-young was merely tolerating him for a while. This time too, after being incredibly kind, he would throw him down to the bottom. And yet, despite knowing this, the feeling of Seo Hae-young’s cock ramming into his torn-open hole was welcome. It felt good. It was a jumbled mess of feelings—ticklish, then a sensation of his stomach floating. It seemed Seo Hae-young’s way had already been carved into his body. He wished it were deeper, stronger, like before. Ah, but he mustn’t. It was something that shouldn’t happen. He had vowed every day not to go along with it. He had vowed so many times not to be seduced… and yet, with trembling legs, he wanted to wrap himself around Seo Hae-young’s waist.

“A-uuu…”

His trembling, sliding hand gripped the hair. He clenched it tight, as if to pull it out. The pain of his scalp being peeled away momentarily killed the pleasure. He could vaguely see the crown of the head bowed down, sucking on his unremarkable chest. His erect nipple was sucked between bright red lips and bitten here and there. With a popping sound, the nipple emerged from the lips, the clear tooth marks being covered by a soft tongue, and a rough breath finally swept over the path the tongue had taken.

“Ha-euk, ngh…! Heup…”

Biting his lower lip hard, Hae-won looked down at his thighs, shaking while hooked over his wrists, and the space between them. The junction was hidden by the top Seo Hae-young was wearing, but the squelching noise and the feeling of being filled inside were maddeningly clear. He inhaled sharply and turned his eyes away. He wanted to carve out his remaining ear and cut off everything below his waist.

“Stop, uu… ugh, stop it…”

Letting out a suppressed sob while tearing at his hair, Hae-won let go of his bleeding lips. The moment he faced Seo Hae-young’s face—cheeks flushed red and eyes unfocused as he rammed his cock in—an unbearable sense of dissonance exploded into a scream. “Ack!” he shrieked, flailing his limbs.

At the renewed resistance, Seo Hae-young pushed his penis in deep, gripping Hae-won’s gasping thighs tightly and leaving bite marks. Signs of a seizure appeared in Hae-won, who was trembling with his chin tilted up. It was evident how much tension he was holding; beneath his taut Adam’s apple, his mottled naked body was revealed, bathed in warm light. Seo Hae-young slowly stroked the nape and chest marked with grotesque red lip prints, and the lower abdomen where the shape of the glans could almost be felt through the thin skin, waiting for him to calm down. However, Hae-won continued to shed tears, taking irregular, hitching breaths.

“Take it, take it out… take it out, Hae-young… I-I’m sorry. I was wrong, I’m sorry… please…”

Hae-won, whose knuckles had turned red, rubbed his palms together. Seo Hae-young stared blankly at the hands rubbing up and down as if begging, and slowly moved his hips.

“What are you sorry for…”

“I can’t, I can’t do it… Ha, ha-eu… I shouldn’t, it’s not right…”

Seeing the hole that tightened only when he withdrew and the legs that tensed the moment he shoved his cock in, it was clear that Hae-won was enjoying it, and an absurd laugh escaped him.

“Why are you acting up again…”

Leaning his upper body down, Seo Hae-young lightly kissed the lips that kept repeating the plea to take it out, and stroked the not-yet-fully-erect penis. He thrust his hips slightly, making a slapping sound. He gritted his teeth, feeling as if he might cum at any moment inside the hole that clamped him so tightly he couldn’t move. Pressed down by Seo Hae-young, who was thrusting faster and faster, Hae-won raised a collapsed hand to fumble at his own neck. His eyes rolled anxiously in all directions, and incoherent mutterings spilled from his mouth.

“I, I shouldn’t be doing this, ah…! I… I shouldn’t… Huck, fuck…, if I do this…”

The skin, being scratched by fingernails, turned white and then quickly flushed pink. Tears pooled, making it impossible to see, but he knew Seo Hae-young was looking down at him. He scratched his suffocating neck violently, then gathered his hands to beg, and finally, his lips trembled into something resembling a smile.

“Hae, Hae-young. If I, ah… if I do that, then… what about me… I want to die. What am I supposed to do…”

“Breathe properly.”

The hand was pulled away from the nape where drops of blood had begun to form. Suddenly deprived of a way to vent his distress, Hae-won jolted his upper body, twisting his captured wrists wildly. Tears fell in droplets down his temples, and his completely hoarse, ruined voice filled the small room.

“Let go! Let me go… D-don’t touch me. Stop it!”

“Hey, Hae-won…”

“Heup…!”

A large hand clamped over his mouth and nose. His stifled lips were pressed into the palm, and the back of his head was crushed against the floor. His grown-out hair stuck to the floor, amplifying the sense of urgency. Instead of breathing, Hae-won continued his resistance with his freed wrists. He hit his own head, tore at his hair, and then his arms, pushing against Seo Hae-young’s shoulders, trembled violently. No matter how much he hit and scratched everything he touched, the lump in his chest would not dissolve.

“Uuu…! Ngh…!”

As the time without breath grew longer, the limit approached in great strides. Seo Hae-young, still covering his mouth, pushed his hips forward again, and the limit that had been creeping closer now came rushing in. The glans violently struck and rummaged through his overturned stomach. As he let out gasping breaths, someone began to appear over Seo Hae-young, whose groin was pressed against his. It was Go Tae-gyeom, it was his father, it was Joo Hyun-woo, the General Manager… all sorts of people were overlaid upon the face. The terror doubled. He flailed his legs frantically, but all his feet kicked were the blanket and the slippery floor.

“Even if you keep acting like this… you only have me. That’s how it’ll be. Right…?”

“Hu-euk, eup…! Heu-ng…!”

His vision turned red. A headless chicken. Then an alleyway thick with fog from the rain, a blood-stained small table, and droplets of blood falling like tears on white cheeks flashed by in succession.

“Kkeuk…! Heup…!”

“I’m the same, Hae-won… We’re the same. I… I only have you too.”

After whispering the low confession, Seo Hae-young covered his mouth with both hands. The palms, now adding weight, choked his airway, and his vision blurred. His outstretched hands flailed, gripping the firm shoulders. Sinking into a terrifying unconsciousness, Hae-won pushed, hit, and swung. What he wanted to escape from was the distorted memories and the fearful past. The shell mounted on top of him seemed to be saying something, but he couldn’t hear it at all.

“U-ugh, heuk…!”

Eventually, the knuckles that had grazed his white cheek bent slightly backward. And… he felt the flesh clearly. Hae-won, who had abruptly stopped struggling, blinked his hazy eyes. Seo Hae-young’s face appeared clearly, then split into two, then three.

An expression of bewilderment and lines drawn across white cheeks. The heart that had been pounding as if to burst calmed down, and he was finally able to breathe properly. The air that had been continuously entering through the gaps of the fingers covering his mouth finally flowed down his windpipe, and the terror that felt like imminent death slowly subsided.

As he let his arm limp beside his head, the bloodstains on the tips of his newly grown, sharp nails throbbed with vibration. His eyes grew wide as he took in the sight of blood slowly gathering on his rounded cheek and a droplet of blood falling from the deepest wound.

“…Ow.”

Seo Hae-young let out a belated, artificial groan, and a deep well formed in his cheek. His eyelashes, lowering and then rising, fluttered like the wings of a butterfly.

“It hurts…”

Hae-won reached out a trembling hand toward Seo Hae-young, who was wiping the three distinct scratches on his cheek with the back of his hand. As he cupped the cheek, he pulled the face that leaned in obediently. The breath that had been rising as if he would flip over had now settled so quietly that he didn’t even know he was exhaling. So quiet that it wouldn’t even reach Seo Hae-young, who willingly bowed his waist.

Facing the wound he had caused up close, Hae-won stroked the reddened area around the wound with a trembling thumb and let out a pitiful sob. Hae-won’s eyes were not a cornucopia of treasures, but a cornucopia of emotions. Tears flowed uncontrollably from eyes like a sandy beach submerged by waves. Seo Hae-young, turning his head to display the wound prominently, pressed his lips to the palm and whispered.

“Are you not angry anymore?”

He didn’t answer, but the utterly distorted expression was explanation enough.

“See. We just… have to keep living like this.”

Having given such a trivial answer, Seo Hae-young chuckled. He no longer saw other people’s faces in that face. Only then did the remaining hand covering his mouth let go. It was a hideous hand, a hand that trembled frequently and couldn’t grip things properly. His lips burned as if they had been scorched.

Despair surged like a wave. A high wave that he had no choice but to be swept away by. Unable to say a word, he only looked at the smiling Seo Hae-young.

How should he explain it? There were no words to describe a human who was beautiful yet didn’t look beautiful, kind yet wasn’t kind, and someone he hated dreadfully yet couldn’t let go of. Seo Hae-young, composed of complex and ambivalent words, lowered his head. It was a kiss that he had to accept even though he knew it was all a lie. It was simply a sad and hopeless kiss.

* * *

Alcohol was a fairly plausible excuse. That was why his father had drunk until he died. Because it allowed one to momentarily forget the things they had to do, the mistakes of the past, and unclear emotions. He hadn’t understood it when he was young, but now he knew better than anyone. Why he had lived like such trash.

As the resistance faded, a humid heat, like midsummer, enveloped his body. Drenched strands of hair clung to his forehead, then became disheveled whenever the movements grew violent. A liquid mixture of melted lotion and semen messily soaked the groins of the two people, who were slamming together and pulling apart without respite. It was a pleasure that felt as if his eyes would roll back. Gripping the forearm of Seo Hae-young, who held his waist, Hae-won arched his upper body and rubbed the back of his head against the floor with a pained expression.

“Ah! A-heuuk…!”

“Haah……, Yoon Hae-won…….”

He wanted to ejaculate now, but it felt as if he had been stopped right at the threshold for hours, or perhaps days. His rock-hard erection had turned a vivid red and remained swollen, yet he could not reach the point of release.

“Ugh……! Hae-young, Hae-young…….”

He slammed the back of his head against the floor and tugged at his forearms. He felt like he was going crazy. The vague sense of longing sharpened as time passed. As what he desired became clear, an unbearable misery surged up within him. A little more, I mean……. His lips parted as if to request something, but in the end, they closed without a word.

“Yeah, what is it…….”

As he hesitated, the tip of a nose brushed softly against him. It was a ticklish whisper that contrasted with the waist thrusting the member in short, rapid bursts as ejaculation drew near. Gasping for breath, Hae-won lifted his reddened eyes to meet a blurred face. His vision wasn’t clear due to the constant shaking. He raised a hand pooled with warm heat and stroked the area near the cheek.

“Hae-young, Hae-young……. Heugh, ugh……!”

It was warm, and he hated looking at it. The hand that had been hovering around the wounds—which looked as if they had been torn by blunt claws rather than scratched by nails—moved down. He grasped a firm wrist, groping the waist where bruises in the shape of handprints were sure to remain. Seo Hae-young, who compliantly gave his hand, watched Hae-won trapped in his arms and gave a shallow upward thrust of his hips. Even though Hae-won pulled slightly, his wrist was drawn in smoothly, and he furrowed his brow.

“Ha-eu, ugh…….”

“What’s wrong…….”

Every time his perineum was pressed, the conflict boiling in his lower abdomen scattered. Even back when he lived with Gi-tae, when he would dream of Seo Hae-young and sneak out of bed at dawn to go to the bathroom, the reason he could never reach the end was because of this. Instead of a request, only suppressed moans and tears came out.

He wanted to ejaculate. He felt as if his brain were cooked red and he might die just like this. What should he do? What could he do? As Seo Hae-young’s hip movements quickened and his breathing deepened, the back of Hae-won’s neck tingled.

“Why, Hae-won……. Do you hate it? Is it disgusting…… being like this with me?”

“Augh……! Ah……!”

The body that had been shaking gently was suddenly pushed upward. With a loud thwack, Seo Hae-young drove his cock in and rotated his hips as if rubbing the junction. At the movement that seemed to carve shapes into every part of the inner wall while stirring inside, thin eyelids trembled. Having already driven it in to the root so that the stomach felt full, Seo Hae-young pushed the waist he held with one hand downward, adding weight as if he wanted to go deeper.

“Hae-young, ah……. Heu-ut……!”

“Hmm? I like it, though…….”

A pleasure that twisted his body burned away a strand of reason. He reached out and pulled Seo Hae-young’s hand—the one he had been gripping so hard his fingertips turned white—and placed it over his neck. The warmth that had touched his chest, waist, and thighs now reached a fragile part of his body. The moment anticipation spread like a spark, the hip movements that hadn’t rested for a second stopped. Seo Hae-young, looking down for a while with an unreadable expression, slowly rolled his clouded eyes.

As Hae-won gasped for breath, a sneer—a sharp kh—burst from lips that curled upward. Soon, a rough, low laugh followed, sounding as if he were scratching his throat. With his ears flushed bright red, Hae-won swallowed words he couldn’t bring himself to speak and wiped his tear-filled eyes.

“Heugh, heuu…….”

The misery was unbearable. A sense of shame, humiliation, and defeat washed over him, making him want to slam his head until it broke or simply die. As he let out a sobbing sound like a moan, a soft index finger tickled his collarbone.

“Want me to strangle you?”

It was a suggestive question. The finger, sliding up his neck as if playing, stroked his throbbing Adam’s apple and then pressed hard into the hollow. Just the pressure brought a dizzying fear, and the inside of the hole gripping the member twitched. His heart raced. Regardless of what it meant, the fear he felt only from Seo Hae-young was intertwined with sexual desire. This was so blatant that the partner connected to him could not possibly miss it.

“Like this?”

“Heup, kukh……!”

A broad hand suddenly gripped his neck. Having his breath stolen by a single white hand, Hae-won kicked his legs, pushing against the floor. Seo Hae-young gave no leeway, just as he did with his insertions, and immediately strangled him with sheer grip strength. The grip was so strong that blood quickly rushed to his face. The member that had partially slipped out was driven back in, and his straight heels slid.

“Do you…… like this?”

“Kuh, hueugh……! Heuu, ung……!”

“You should tell me……. Ah……, I like it too, Hae-won…….”

The crumpled blanket beneath his back was pushed away, and his bent legs trembled violently. Seo Hae-young’s lips were stretched wide as he strangled him with both hands and frantically thrust his hips. The pupils, nearly rolling back behind the eyelids, captured an expression of absolute ecstasy.

Hae-won felt a sense of stability within the deathly fear whenever the firm hand loosened and he could take a deep breath, and then tightened again. This wasn’t the man pretending to be kind; this was the Seo Hae-young he knew.

“Heugh……! Hik, hueup, kuheuk……!”

The inner walls, clinging to the surface of the thick member, were dragged along every time Seo Hae-young pulled his hips back. It felt as if his body, the hole accepting Seo Hae-young’s cock, was about to break and be destroyed. Transparent fluid beaded at the tip of the member, which hit his stomach while fully erect. Pain that felt as if he were truly suffocating or having his stomach pierced sounded a warning alarm, but Hae-won did not try to pull away Seo Hae-young’s wrists. It felt so good he could die. Just as ejaculation was imminent, Seo Hae-young pulled his hips back until the glans caught on the heated hole, then drove the shaft in to the end in one go.

“Hng……! Kukh……!”

His body, which didn’t just bend softly, writhed as if struck by lightning. His toes curled tightly and then snapped open. His hips lifted, and semen burst from the untouched member. The semen, splattered up to his chest, paused for as long as he had endured and then flowed out again; just when he thought he had released everything, it dripped out in small bursts, wetting his lower abdomen.

“Uung, heuk……. Heuuuu…….”

“Haah…….”

The hole, which had been well-relaxed, now tightened as if to snap the member, urging Seo Hae-young on. While he hammered in as ejaculation neared, the veins bulging on the back of his hand were scratched by sharp nails. Seo Hae-young leaned his upper body over Hae-won, who was suffering and drooling saliva he couldn’t swallow, and kissed his vacant face while urgently shaking his hips.

“Ah, hueu…….”

“Heu-ok……! Ku-heup, kukh……! Haah……!”

“Heu-ut…….”

The moment his neck was released, Hae-won took a deep breath and coughed. Embracing him, Seo Hae-young poured thick semen into the churning organs. After a few more thrusts with low moans, Seo Hae-young pushed all the semen in without letting any leak out and buried his face in the nape of Hae-won’s neck, who was busy breathing. He kissed the various spots on the neck marked with bright red handprints, making the marks even deeper. An ecstasy so overwhelming it felt like losing his mind made his voice float.

“I fucking love it whenever you’re like this……. It feels like we’re a perfect match…….”

The sensation of sweat-soaked skin sticking and peeling away was chillingly good. It was good when their lips barely touched and then parted, and it was good when he sucked the moist skin and let go. While kissing several times along the lean jawline, a voice thick with a sense of injustice caught his ear.

“Every day, huff……. Every day, it was like that……. That’s why, that’s why it’s like this……. I, I really, I……. It’s not my fault…….”

The mumbling continued, with a clear intention to evade as much as possible. Intoxicated by the afterglow of a complete ejaculation, Hae-won kicked his feet and burst into tears.

“I, I don’t want to be like this……. It feels crazy, like I’m insane, and because you’re strange……. I’m becoming strange too, that kind of…….”

A sense of exhaustion and emptiness enveloped his entire body. Like the day he was trapped on the cold-windy veranda, a chill emanated from the hot floor. Hae-won covered his face with trembling palms. What on earth had he asked for? He wanted to hide in a hole. He even wanted to just hang himself. Gripping his wet hair with hands stained with tears, he wept with a cry drenched in regret.

Why had he waited for something like this? Seo Hae-young and his crowd must have ruined him. He was certainly broken back then, three years ago. He could no longer be called normal.

“Now, now…… what do I do. What am I supposed to do……. I, I didn’t do that…….”

“No, Hae-won. You were born that way. You were born that way to live like this with me.”

Seo Hae-young, who had been watching silently, shook his head. The mouth forming sentences clearly so he could understand and the eyes filled with conviction pierced his chest. Opening his uglily distorted lips, Hae-won wore an expression that was almost a smile, then wiped his face.

“No……, no. I’m just drunk, that’s why……. I don’t…… I don’t really know.”

As if searching for something to escape to, his clenched fist naturally struck his straight forehead. Seo Hae-young left Hae-won alone for a moment as he acted frantically, hitting his own head and tearing at his hair, and soon let out a short sigh. Grabbing the hem of the knit stained with Hae-won’s semen and stripping it off in one motion, his dark hair became messily disheveled. Pieces of sunlight, breaking against his upper body with the sun behind him, seeped into his white skin.

“Do it here. There’s plenty of empty space.”

Seo Hae-young, who twisted away Hae-won’s wrist as he tried to scratch his own neck, placed Hae-won’s nails on his own shoulder. Noticing the smooth skin touching his palm, Hae-won stared blankly at Seo Hae-young, who was smiling with a scarred face, then dropped his gaze. A long, healing scar near the collarbone made him frown, but below that, it was clean…….

“Oh…….”

The ravaged skin poured into his expanded field of vision. It wasn’t clean. No matter how much he blinked or rubbed his eyes with his free hand, this wasn’t the Seo Hae-young he knew. The flawless, smooth skin was gone, and traces of being sliced dozens of times by something sharp and having skin gouged out were packed across both arms.

“I did well, right?”

Smiling shyly as if wanting praise, Seo Hae-young pulled his member out from between the buttocks. The feeling of the stomach becoming empty felt strange, and the semen clinging to the glans stretched long, connecting to the interior of the hole.

“I didn’t really want to show you.”

The lamenting tone was excessively nonchalant. The hand gripping the member, drenched in sticky fluid, slapped the groin with the shaft.

“We’ve become so similar, haven’t we?”

“Ah……, ugh…….”

Hae-won couldn’t take his eyes off the scars that were similar to the ones left on his own wrists. The moment he realized they had only been washed together, but never actually washed together, an indescribable sigh escaped.

The face wearing a bright smile, as if immensely proud and satisfied, clashed with the boiling emotions. Seo Hae-young licked his lips with his tongue, and even when he pulled his knees up and gripped his ankles, Hae-won’s blocked throat would not open.

“So, do it here.”

Seo Hae-young said it as if it were nothing, grabbing his member—which had become rock-hard and touched his stomach despite barely being touched—and pushing it into the gasping hole. Hae-won, carefully stroking the scars that weren’t very deep but must have caused enough pain, the scars that looked quite old, and the marks that looked exactly like the ones on his own arms, slowly covered his eyes with both palms.

Ah, this……. This wasn’t it. He had never wanted this.

“I told you to do it here.”

Fingers pushed through his scalp and grabbed his hair. His hand that had been hitting his face was snatched away, and his cheek, pressed against the floor, became damp. A flame starting from the tips of his toes burned upward, higher and higher, through his entire body. Agony and pleasure, unable to stay still for a second, were tightly bunched together. Then, that hard lump tightened around his chest.

Hae-won hugged the arm he had offered for Seo Hae-young to scratch or bite as he pleased and buried his face in the palm engraved with scars. Even as he cried in distress, he didn’t know how to face the discrepancy coming from these contradictory emotions. The member stirring inside his stomach felt good, and the hand that harshly pulled his hair or gripped his neck felt even better. He hated the hideous scars, and he hated himself even more for letting out vulgar moans, consumed by pleasure. As life by Seo Hae-young’s side always was, it was a series of moments that were twisted, detached, and mismatched.

The reddish-purple light of the sunset, passing through the opaque window, stained the floor. If there was one thing different from the basement, it was that the sun shone well; if there was one thing similar, it was that there was no clock in this room either. It felt like about two hours had passed, but it could have been three. Regardless of how much time had passed, the fact that it was grueling did not change. Lying prone on the bedding that hung heavy with moisture, Hae-won groaned, unaware that his rubbing forehead was stinging.

“Hng……, hut……!”

“If anyone saw us, they’d be fucking shocked, right……. Doing this with a younger brother.”

Sweat beaded at the tips of his hair and dripped down. Unable to leave a single scratch on Seo Hae-young’s body, his arms were pinned behind his back, and the blood stopped flowing to his hands. His twisted shoulders were stiff, but his gripped wrists were even more stinging. And below his kneeling knees, there was no sensation. Almost everything he felt was from between his buttocks, where he accepted Seo Hae-young as easily as if a path had been cleared.

“Hueu, ut……. Uung…….”

The member pushed deep into the hole, tightly pressing the swollen inner walls. His strengthless waist twitched, and thin semen bursting from the tip of the glans fell onto the blanket. He couldn’t remember how many times he had ejaculated, or how many times he had received an ejaculation. Everything was so damp and sticky that it felt as if semen were sloshing around inside his stomach.

“Hae-won…….”

The moment Seo Hae-young let out a languid sigh and released his grip, the sliding arm flopped down. A hand dug into Hae-won’s lower abdomen, which was so drenched in sweat that lips would slide right off, and gripped the glistening member. The hand shaking the member, as if squeezing out what was no longer there, caused a painful pleasure.

“Ha-eugh……! Uuu……. Hae, Hae-young…….”

His tongue, unable to even articulate properly, mumbled and endlessly called one person’s name. His pressed thighs twisted, but the chest pressing down on his back was heavy, so he couldn’t escape. Just being touched felt like he would die, yet the member buried deep began to move back and forth.

The sound of sticky things sticking and peeling apart echoed from below his waist. His limp body swayed and fluttered as an unbearable sensation struck. While he could only let out shallow moans, hollowing out his stomach, Seo Hae-young finally pressed his lips to his ear, moving his hand and waist relentlessly while letting out a soft laugh.

“Hut, ung……! Ah, ah-heuu……!”

“Hae-won……, do you like it when Hyung does this for you?”

“Don’t……, don’t do that……. Hut, ah-heuk…….”

Shameful jokes flowed steadily into his ears. The position, something only a beast would do, and the place where he couldn’t resist even slightly were humiliating, yet his panting breath only grew louder. Hae-won rubbed his forehead and cheeks wildly against the rough blanket. His vision repeatedly blacked out.

“Answer me……. We’re family here, aren’t we…….”

“Ah……! Ah, stop……. Your hand, please…….”

His fingertips, where blood had dried, gripped the rustling fabric as if to tear it, then urgently moved toward the space between his legs. He grabbed his shaking wrist and curled his back, but he couldn’t ignore the urge to urinate brought by the thumb rubbing as if stirring the glans.

“Ah, I think I’m going to cum……. Ugh, hueugh……!”

“Yeah……. I think I’m going to cum too…….”

“Heu-ok……! Kkuk……! Heuuuu…….”

The well-shaped buttocks were thrust upward rapidly. The hip movements became so violent that white foam formed at the entrance where the root of the member pushed in. Hae-won shook his head, making sounds as if he were losing his breath, but he couldn’t escape the hand squeezing his member or the member destroying his lower abdomen. Thump, when the lower bodies locked without a gap, thump, his mind blurred. Despair vanished and shame disappeared. His toes curled and his shins tightened. The moment a pleasure that swallowed his consciousness surged, his waist trembled violently and his limbs writhed like insects.

“Ah……, ah…….”

The clear liquid trickling out drenched the space between his kneeling thighs and Seo Hae-young’s palm. As Seo Hae-young, who had not yet ejaculated, thrust his hips upward, clean droplets splattered onto the duvet. A distant groan escaped as the lukewarm liquid flowed down his rigid legs, soaking the empty spaces. It was a waterlogged sound, a self-reproach for being someone who deserved every kind of vulgar insult.

“What am I going to do with you, leaking like this, Hae-won….”

A wet palm pressed firmly against his lower abdomen. Gasping, Hae-won held his breath as he was lifted by the arm crossing his chest. Relying entirely on Seo Hae-young’s strength, his swaying, bound body didn’t feel like his own. The hand gripping his firm thigh tightened, leaving another mark on his clean skin. It felt as if he were screaming, or perhaps he was merely choking on his own breath. This sensation was so long overdue that it was terrifying, and infinitely shameful.

Seo Hae-young buried his teeth in the nape of his neck and thrust a few more times, and Hae-won simply swayed. Eventually, the semen from the member ejaculating inside the hole seeped in without exception, fouling his organs. Seo Hae-young’s voice, whispering against his shoulder, sounded very close, then distant, then vanished entirely, repeating the cycle.

“I really… wish you were my brother. Then we… could never be apart….”

“Hng, ugh….”

His cheeks trembled. Eyes that were neither open nor closed captured the shadowed wall. A strange shadow, where the two bodies overlapped as one, wavered and mixed with a red light. It was an exquisite sight. Heavy eyelids fell, slowly covering the shadow starting from their two heads.

* * *

“Hae-won—. Yoon Hae-won.”

Seo Hae-young, having laid Hae-won flat as if he were escaping, kissed him while stroking his hair, which was soaked and dark in color. He pressed his lips firmly before pulling away, but unlike in a fairy tale, Hae-won’s eyes did not open. When a pouty expression covered his face, a hand reached up. A palm, with slightly more force than a playful touch, slapped his cheek. His head whipped to the side, but since the force was closer to a push than a strike, it didn’t seem to hurt much; his half-open eyes quickly closed again.

“Why are you sleeping already…. It’s not even night yet.”

Seo Hae-young rubbed the reddened cheek with a rough touch, then pinched and kneaded both cheeks, openly displaying his dissatisfaction. He tapped the cheek a few more times, but the result was the same. Left with no choice, he draped the limp legs over his shoulders and pinched the bright red, swollen nipple.

“Ngh….”

“Wake up….”

Rolling Hae-won’s unresponsive nipple between his fingers, he stuck out his tongue and sucked it. As he gathered the chest—where only skin was caught—and sucked, Hae-won frowned and groaned, rubbing the back of his head. There was no sign of him waking up.

Coincidentally, Seo Hae-young had absolutely no aversion to having sex with a sleeping Hae-won. It wasn’t that he didn’t feel a sense of regret, but that wasn’t a reason to stop. Sucking on the skin where he hadn’t yet left a mark, Seo Hae-young inserted himself again into the damp hole. Though there was no strength to tighten to the point of breaking, the inner walls wrapping around the shaft with a moderate pressure were chillingly lovely.

“Haa, ah….”

With no reason to restrain himself, he gripped the upper thighs tightly and thrust his hips upward. Hae-won, limp as a corpse, swayed as he was shaken and was pulled as he was grabbed. Sometimes, he liked him like this. Rebelling was fun in its own way, and having seizures wasn’t particularly bothersome. In fact, if he counted the things he didn’t like, it would be faster to count them. Even those had existed in the past, but lately… there didn’t seem to be any.

“Ngh….”

It was a sense of security that made him want to stay buried there even if his neck were to be snapped right now. Curling the corners of his mouth, Seo Hae-young forced a kiss onto the lips that were slightly parted, revealing the tongue, and shook his hips. The soft sensation against the tip of his tongue was terribly pleasant.

He occasionally gripped the wide-open, aimlessly swaying thighs tightly, and as he pulled his cock out, he explored the sleeping Hae-won by sliding fingers into the hole where the semen he had intentionally left inside leaked out bit by bit. He kissed the red tip of the nose and the eyes, raw from frequent tears, and pushed his tongue into the mouth that let out faint moans, feeling everything even while unconscious. Just as he was scanning the bumpy palate and sucking on the lower lip.

“Are you there?”

A young voice was heard. Following that, a human shadow flickered beyond the opaque window. Half-closed eyes turned toward the window and then slowly dropped. There was only one door leading from the porch into the main room, and the lock was simply a metal hook, like a fishing hook, attached to the doorframe. And right now… it wasn’t hooked. The sound of footsteps on the porch approached, as if someone were about to open the door and enter at any moment. Seo Hae-young looked at the closed door and slowly moved his hips.

“Mng….”

Hae-won tossed and turned, tilting his head to the opposite side. The groins, meeting rhythmically between the spread legs with a sticky sound, did not separate even though someone was pacing in front of the unlocked door.

It was the time when the sunset had faded and night was arriving, an evening where Seo Hae-young was pumping semen into Hae-won, whom he introduced as his brother. Looking at the darkening sky, Gi-tae, sitting on the porch, placed the side dishes he had packed beside him. The bag, filled with meat pancakes, seasoned vegetables, and sautéed bellflower root, rustled as it crumpled. They were all things that Hae-won, who usually had a small appetite, particularly enjoyed.

He could have just left them in the refrigerator, but he had waited about ten minutes wanting to see a face. The presence approached not from the front gate, but from the main room. The door to the main room, which he thought was empty, creaked open, and a man he had never properly spoken with poked his head out. To use the words of old people, he had a pretty face, but to Gi-tae, he looked cold; there was absolutely nothing about him that resembled Hae-won.

“Hello.”

Seo Hae-young, who had been staring blankly at Gi-tae sitting on the porch, greeted him first. Brushing back his disheveled hair, Seo Hae-young stepped onto the porch and closed the messy main room door. Gi-tae’s expression stiffened slightly as he waited for Hae-won, who should have followed him out with wide eyes. Pushing the side dishes toward Seo Hae-young, who was sitting on the porch tearing open a new pack of cigarettes, he looked back at the main room.

“I brought some things for dinner. Where’s the kid?”

Seo Hae-young, pulling out a new cigarette and shaking a cheap lighter bought from a convenience store, wore an expression of incomprehension.

“Who?”

His pronunciation was slurred, but the question was clear enough to understand. Not realizing why he was asking back when it was obvious who he was talking about, Gi-tae fell silent. He thought Seo Hae-young would realize and tell him soon. However, Seo Hae-young only lit the tip of the cigarette he was smoking for the first time in a while and did not speak first. Eventually, as he watched Seo Hae-young inhale through the filter, Gi-tae scrutinized his face to find any resemblance and reluctantly spoke.

“…Hae-won, that kid.”

Seo Hae-young, exhaling a cloud of murky smoke, finally broke his indifferent expression and smirked. A dimple appeared. It was something Hae-won didn’t have.

“Ah. He’s sleeping. He’s sick.”

“Where does it hurt?”

Recalling how Hae-won frequently had seizures, Gi-tae frowned. Seo Hae-young was not one to miss that change. Tending to inflate even simple worry into something larger, Seo Hae-young inhaled the dizzying smoke and looked around the empty yard, choosing his words.

“Just… a cold.”

He gave a plausible answer. Since Hae-won would likely be lying around aching again tomorrow, it wasn’t a lie. He said it hoping Gi-tae would leave at this point, but for Gi-tae, who didn’t know the full story, it was a reason to solidify his resolve to see a face before leaving. Just as Gi-tae took off his shoes, stepped onto the porch, and grabbed the doorknob while wondering if there was anything suitable to put in porridge, a calm voice stopped his hand.

“Hae-won is a good boy. He’s pretty.”

The nauseating smell of cigarette smoke brushed past his nose. Turning around, he saw Seo Hae-young sitting with his back turned, smoking. From his broad shoulders and large frame to his dark hair, there was nowhere to find a resemblance to Hae-won. Even his voice was different.

“He was like that when he was young, too. He did everything he was told… and he listened well.”

The burn mark on the hand that dropped the cigarette onto the porch vanished for a moment. When Seo Hae-young turned around, the blood-dried cheek caught the eye. While Gi-tae looked displeased at the cheek marked with three lines as if scratched by a beast, the unnervingly bright red lips opened.

“He’s my brother. Hae-won.”

It was a completely unpredictable conversation. Just as Gi-tae frowned, unable to keep up with the dialogue, Seo Hae-young stood up and reached out. Their heights were similar, so their gazes locked easily. Slowly taking the doorknob, Seo Hae-young smiled with a subtle sense of distance and opened the main room door slightly. Through the gap in the door, Gi-tae saw scattered clothes, but he did not discover Hae-won in the corner.

“I’ll enjoy the food.”

Leaving behind words that were polite but sounded very ambiguous, Seo Hae-young slipped into the room, and the door closed firmly. Gi-tae dropped the hand that couldn’t hold the doorknob. Amidst the smell of cigarettes emanating from Seo Hae-young, who had just brushed past him, there was a smell he couldn’t mistake. It was the smell of semen.

After fastening the lock, which felt as if it would rip off with a slight shake, Seo Hae-young stripped off the knit sweater clinging to his sticky body. As he irritably pushed back his hair, the mirror on the wall caught his eye. Standing before the mirror—perhaps a souvenir, as it had a date and the name of a hall written on it—Seo Hae-young reflected his face on the clean surface.

The long nail marks on his cheek were bright red, and the surrounding area was stained pink. As the finger stroking the torn skin touched the end of the wound, his gloomily sunken face instantly brightened. When he dug his nails in and scratched a bit more, the blood that had stopped began to well up. After staring at the mirror for a long time with a satisfied smile, Seo Hae-young listened to the footsteps disappearing from the porch and turned his head.

His steps toward Hae-won, who lay amidst the disheveled duvet and was smeared with saliva, could not have been lighter. He pulled the ankle, which bore a distinct handprint, and draped it over his thigh, hugging the limp body tightly. Pressing his ear to the chest, he heard a regular heartbeat. The smile on his lips did not fade. This was not a fake.

“I held back. I hated it, but I held back. I did well, didn’t I?”

Seo Hae-young murmured, rubbing the wound on his cheek against the center of the chest, and at the same time, prayed fervently. He hoped the first wound Hae-won had left him would fester and scar so that it would never be erased.

Early that morning, the only duvet and two pillowcases in the house were hung on the clothesline crossing the yard. A colder wind gently shook the fabric, spreading the thick scent of detergent throughout the house. No matter how much Seo Hae-young kissed and touched him, Hae-won never once opened his eyes, as if he didn’t want to wake up. Just as he smiled while kneading the bloodless, pale cheek.

‘Hae-young.’

The voice was heard again. The source was behind his back. Without needing to cover himself, Seo Hae-young, who had his head on the warm floor, turned his back to the fake whispering anxiety and burrowed into Hae-won’s embrace. The voice, crackling like a radio with the wrong frequency, clung to his ear.

‘This is all a dream. You’re just sleeping in your own house, and I’m dead.’

His throat tightened, and the nape of his neck bristled with tension. It was the thing he least wanted to hear and the most unbelievable story. The heartbeat proving he was alive, the breath, and the warm heat were the only things he could believe in. He hurriedly sucked on the skin and pushed his knees between the corpse-like legs, but the whispering voice did not disappear.

Hating the feeling that reality didn’t feel like reality, the feeling of wandering in a dream, he grabbed Hae-won’s shoulders and shook him. He urged him to wake up and say something, but Hae-won remained silent. He could have woken him by slapping his cheek or kicking his stomach, but he didn’t want to ruin the peace he had finally regained.

‘I don’t like you. I just wish you were dead.’

The desolate laughter deepened. In the deepening night, Seo Hae-young, with his forehead pressed against the unconscious Hae-won’s chest, gnawed on his fingernails, biting into the tender flesh. After listing the reasons why he should endure and the reasons why he didn’t have to, he sided with the latter. He reached out both arms and hugged the person he loved, and had always loved. He was anxious. Everything was anxious. To the point where he wished Hae-won would sleep forever if he wasn’t going to say the words he wanted to hear.

He burrowed deep, deep to escape the voice, but the accusations echoing in his head incited anxiety and set it ablaze. He was comfortable yet afraid, and sleep did not come.

* * *

Seo Hae-young’s prediction that he would be aching and sick did not miss the mark. Or rather, it wouldn’t be wrong to say he made the prediction come true. Hae-won could not leave the room. His body wasn’t so weak that he would fall ill every time the season changed, but it was the conclusion reached because his mind, which had internally held onto a string of tension even while appearing swept away, could not withstand the current situation.

With muscle pain as the primary cause, he couldn’t move a muscle. Hae-won, held by Seo Hae-young—who believed he was caring for him with utmost devotion—was fed tasteless porridge and swallowed medicine. The pills, divided into translucent medicine packets, were so numerous that they amounted to a handful, requiring him to take them in two doses. He swallowed them without complaint, but he didn’t know what medicine they were.

“Here.”

Seo Hae-young, having felt his burning forehead, pushed the pills into his mouth one by one and tilted the water cup against his lips. The unidentified pills slid down his open throat. After swallowing the medicine that would bring sleep within an hour, he blinked his swollen eyes, and the detergent-scented duvet wrapped warmly around his tingling body. And the hand, specialized in strangling necks and slapping cheeks, gently patted his chest. When he turned his body from facing the ceiling to the side, the warmth clinging to his back was suffocating, as if something terrible would happen if they separated.

He had no strength to roll away, and saying “go away” was even more difficult. So, he had no choice but to watch the TV as the channels changed. Since there was nothing particularly worth watching, the screen, which had stopped once on a movie channel, rotated and showed a scene with a lush green field as the background.

「They say there was an injury, but it seems he has recovered well….」

A calm voice was heard. In the unconsciousness where the effect of the medicine began to spread distantly, Hae-won discovered a familiar face. He grabbed Seo Hae-young’s hand, which was about to change the channel immediately. Taking the old remote from the flinching hand, he returned to the previous channel. It was a golf tournament broadcast. …It wasn’t a mistake. A man wearing a white hat was shown in a close-up, revealing a familiar face.

「Lee Hee-sung’s third shot. He’s now one stroke behind the leader. Great shot. It was a difficult position….」

Drowsiness vanished, and his heart pounded. Forgetting to blink, he stared at Lee Hee-sung’s face filling the screen. The man’s lips parted in a wide smile, revealing white teeth. From here, the difference began to show.

Hae-won, who couldn’t remember the last time he had smiled such an untainted smile, felt ashamed of the past when he thought he had any resemblance to Lee Hee-sung for even a moment. At the same time, doubts began to surge. The sound of bones shifting—that day was not an illusion. It was vivid enough that he could pull the memory out at any time. The moment when a cold flower vase poked between his buttocks, he screamed, and Lee Hee-sung’s life, which had offered a pathetic kindness, was also ruined. As that day, for which he didn’t feel entirely sorry, came back to life, his breathing died down.

“Did you like golf?”

Seo Hae-young asked without a hint of surprise. As if he already knew everything, he looked at the screen showing another player with indifferent eyes, then rubbed his lips against the earlobe and murmured, ‘I didn’t know.’ His attention was entirely fixed on the TV, so he didn’t feel the front teeth nibbling on his earlobe.

Lee Hee-sung, who stood out among the crowd, slightly lifted his hat, and the camera captured the image closely. In the screen with exceptionally deep colors, Lee Hee-sung, who was in a place he couldn’t reach even if he stretched out his hand, laughed brightly again, perhaps having heard a joke. The receding camera, the disappearing Lee Hee-sung, and the caster’s voice blended together, and in an instant, he was snapped back to reality.

Hae-won rolled his eyes, scanning the old TV stand, the spacious mother-of-pearl inlaid wardrobe, and the walls covered in yellowed wallpaper. He looked around at a time that had stopped at some point. Like a bird reviewing days gone by, a sordid question created a ripple.

Why is he there? We’re here…

He fidgeted with his scarred hands. It wasn’t jealousy or resentment. It was just a bit strange. No, it was truly strange. As he rustled and turned around, Seo Hae-young, leaning his head against a pillow, opened his eyes slightly wide. Hae-won looked back and forth between the TV and Seo Hae-young, who lifted his chin as if asking why he was looking at him like that. A soft “Ah” of realization escaped the man’s lips as he figured out what Hae-won was asking.

“He wasn’t seriously injured. A shame, right?”

A mischievous smile played on Seo Hae-young’s face as he replied indifferently.

“Still, they said he’d be missing too many rounds, so he wouldn’t be able to maintain his professional career for long.”

There was no malice in Seo Hae-young as he treated the misfortune of another—which he had caused with his own hands—as a mere curiosity. Just as he had when he locked him in the bathroom, slapped his cheeks, or kicked him out onto the veranda.

Hae-won, staring blankly at the side of him that was occasionally chilling, slowly turned back toward the TV. Lee Hee-sung, standing on the field, gripped a long golf club. The sponsor logos on the chest and forearms of his white top were prominent. Suddenly, Hae-won recalled a voice that used to chatter away while giving him sweet snacks. He didn’t know why he suddenly remembered the man saying that he didn’t get many sponsors and that he was taking it easy since he lacked particular talent.

Burying his face in the edge of the blanket, Hae-won blinked his heavy eyelids. He had vaguely thought it would be so, but facing it head-on brought a wave of indescribable emptiness.

This was reality. Everyone had forgotten the past and was living in the present. Everyone had reclaimed their place. Judging by the fact that no obituaries for Joo Hyun-woo and Go Tae-gyeom had arrived, those bastards were likely walking their own paths just fine. They might have entered respectable companies, made new friends, or perhaps they were going to bed every night looking forward to tomorrow.

He didn’t resent them. He just wanted to ask how they could be living so well. What on earth had been so easy? To forget the brief moments of happiness, the past that had been stained into a mess, and just…

His lips parted slightly, but—

“But, why…”

He couldn’t finish the sentence.

Why were we… Why do we have to be like this? While everyone else was walking their own path, only he and Seo Hae-young were trapped in the past, spinning in circles. Why were the things that were so easy for them so incredibly difficult for him, and for Seo Hae-young?

* * *

Hae-won suffered for a full week. The medicine Seo Hae-young fed him kept inducing sleep, so he spent most of his time in dreams, except for the brief moments he opened his eyes. The content was always the same. A revolving projector. A film projecting his desires played back faded memories. He watched the screen show ten years’ worth of life, stopping exactly just before the summer three years ago, and then starting over from the beginning; he laughed frantically and was happy without hesitation. He clapped his hands and laughed until he cried, and then, when the lights in the theater went out, he returned to reality before he had time to prepare his heart.

“Are you getting any sleep? That medicine is quite strong…”

“Yes. He’s sleeping well now.”

“Don’t give it too often or he’ll build a tolerance. If it doesn’t suit him, there are side effects… And the cheeks, make sure to apply the ointment… It’ll scar, I can tell just by looking.”

The sound of a low conversation could be heard from beyond the open door. Looking up at the fluorescent light that was blackened with grime, he tried to move his arms, which felt as limp as water-soaked cotton, when the man, who had entered in the meantime, looked down at him. The head that had been high enough to touch the ceiling dropped suddenly, and a beaming face drew close.

“You’re awake? Let’s wash up.”

Seo Hae-young, bearing a hideous scar on his cheek, supported the back of Hae-won’s head with a hideous hand. The movement of stripping off the sweat-soaked top was natural. He became naked as his pants and underwear were pulled down, but there was no shame. Seo Hae-young lightly lifted the limp body and bowed his head as he stepped over the threshold of the main room. Feet floating in the air dangled and swayed.

Hae-won continued to doze off even while being washed in a bathroom so narrow that it barely fit one person. He dozed while the hands dried his wet hair, and he slid powerlessly while the hands changed his clothes. He merely rubbed his eyelids, which refused to open, against the shoulder of Seo Hae-young, who gave his now-fluffy body a tight hug.

Laughing low as if everything was satisfactory, Seo Hae-young left the room for a moment and returned to feed him porridge that was easy to swallow, one spoonful at a time, and finally poured pills into his palm. Hae-won popped all the clustered pills into his mouth and gulped down the water from a glass. The hand stroking his hair as if praising him was as tender as it was in his dreams.

“I’m going out for a bit, so stay asleep. Understand? You have to be asleep.”

“Mm…”

After hearing the faint reply, Seo Hae-young covered him with the blanket and looked back several times before leaving the room. Closing his eyes, Hae-won gathered sounds with his deficient hearing. Just as the footsteps completely vanished, he pushed aside the stifling blanket, sat up, and drank the remaining half of the water in the glass. Though it wasn’t heavy, his hands trembled violently. When he drank the very last drop, the glass slipped from his hand and fell to the floor.

The glass, falling on its edge, cracked and shattered into pieces. Dropping his curled hands, Hae-won looked around with slow movements. He saw a neatly folded knit sweater. He pulled on the knit that covered the neck where handprints were clearly left and pushed off the floor to stand up from his bedding. He walked unsteadily, forcing himself to maintain a shaking balance.

“Ah…”

The moment he grabbed the doorknob, a dull pain surged. As he slid down and looked at his foot, a fairly large piece of glass was embedded in his heel. Grabbing the glittering edge, he pulled it out of the torn flesh. Perhaps due to the medicine, it didn’t hurt that much, so he tossed the glass shard aside and stood up again. Wiping the bleeding sole of his foot against the linoleum, he headed toward the bathroom. Seo Hae-young was nowhere to be seen.

Opening the bathroom door wide and kneeling before the toilet, Hae-won shoved his fingers into his mouth. After poking around a few times, he felt his stomach flip, and the contents inside surged back up. Painful tears welled up.

After vomiting the porridge and medicine, Hae-won rinsed his mouth and came out to sit on the edge of the wooden veranda. Traces of the season transitioning from autumn to winter hung from the tree branches draped over the wall. As a gust of wind blew, worn-out fallen leaves fluttered down. More than a couple of leaves drifted over the wall and shattered.

Reaching out, Hae-won rubbed his bruised knee. There wasn’t a single spot on his waist or the area where his buttocks touched the veranda that was intact. It was only natural. Even if he were asleep under the influence of drugs, there was no way he wouldn’t feel the sensation of flesh entering and exiting his backside.

Caressing his thighs, which were covered in bite marks, he slowly stood up. Though he had vomited as much as possible, the drug’s effect had not worn off. Staggering across the sandy yard, he stepped into the slippers that had been left on the wall. Pushing his feet, mixed with blood and sand, into the slippers, he opened the main gate. His drug-addled head was still hazy.

He wanted to run away. He wanted to dash somewhere. He wanted to run out into the cold wind and go to a place where no one was. But with these legs, he couldn’t go anywhere he pleased. Thus, he headed toward the most familiar place.

Arriving in front of the house at the top of the alley, Hae-won stepped into the yard without hesitation. Rather than wanting to meet the owner, he had a stronger desire to hide in a stable space. Hesitantly taking off his slippers, he stepped onto the veranda and tried opening the door to the main room. As he looked at the room, which remained largely unchanged whether someone lived there or not, the veranda creaked the moment he closed the door. After the sound of a metal bathroom door clicking shut, a tall man stepped away while shaking his hair. Gi-tae, who was hanging a wet towel on the wall, stopped in his tracks upon discovering Hae-won.

“…I heard you were sick.”

It was a greeting that came out somewhat slowly. After a short hesitation, Hae-won nodded. Gi-tae, who had walked up to within a few feet, stroked his chin where coarse stubble had grown, as if choosing his words. Having been apart for a few months, a different air than before began to seep in. Hae-won called it ‘awkwardness.’ As he hesitantly took his hand off the doorknob and stepped back, Gi-tae plopped down on the veranda and pulled over a box piled high with tangerines.

“The porridge.”

“…Yes?”

“I put abalone in it. Do you hate it?”

“Ah, no. I like it.”

Sitting carefully beside him, Hae-won covered the tangerine Gi-tae handed him with his palm. It seemed he had boiled another full pot and brought it over. However, he had no memory of eating abalone porridge. Seo Hae-young might have thrown it away, or he might have eaten it and forgotten. Assuming he had just eaten it haphazardly, he bowed his head, and a fist-sized tangerine was placed next to his thigh.

“I’ll give you more. Take them with you later.”

Unsure of how to interpret the fact that Hae-won had been merely fiddling with the tangerine the whole time, Gi-tae stood up abruptly and poured tangerines into a black plastic bag until the box was half empty. Though he waved his hands in refusal, Hae-won soon found himself hugging the bulging bag, inhaling the fragrant scent. And once again, the conversation vanished. It was always like this when he was with Gi-tae, but the atmosphere felt different. The distance between him and Gi-tae was barely three spans. The sun was setting, and as night approached, an indefinable sense of distance pressed against his skin.

He had felt this texture once before. He had experienced the moment when familiarity turned into awkwardness, and tenderness turned into a cold disregard that felt like a dagger. On the day he had staggered along the asphalt, shivering with loneliness, the expression Joo Hyun-jeong had shown him was blurry. Back then, he thought he would never forget it for the rest of his life, but in the end, it seemed the past is forgotten.

Hugging the bag of tangerines a bit tighter, Hae-won narrowed his stinging eyes and looked around. The neat scenery felt foreign. He didn’t know what Gi-tae had seen or heard, but it probably wasn’t far from what he imagined. His mind, thrown into chaos by the drugs, spun in circles.

He wanted to vomit it all out. If he couldn’t run away, he had to at least pour it out somewhere. He felt an obligation that he simply had to do so. Staring at the sunset sky with clouded eyes, he opened his trembling lips.

“Hae-young… he’s not my Hyung. Their names are similar, but… we were friends, just friends.”

A conclusion without a single twist flowed from his parted lips. Gi-tae didn’t add anything to the conversation. For Gi-tae, who likely had a feeling from the start that he wasn’t a Hyung, it must have been an even more tedious conclusion. So, Hae-won decided to tell a slightly more interesting story.

His voice, raspy and splitting into several tones, recounted a past he had never told anyone. He glossed over the parts that were scarred and couldn’t be filled, and he blurred the parts that he couldn’t bring himself to tell another person. There were times when the chronological order was wrong, and each time, he made slight corrections. In the story, delivered dryly without the emotions he had felt, Seo Hae-young was Seo Hae-young, Go Tae-gyeom was a friend, and Joo Hyun-woo was described as another friend. The content, which had flowed flatly without a single peak, burst open on a cliff during the rainy season. The reason he had dragged out a story that should have ended and been closed there lay in a painful mistake. Hae-won gripped his wrist, where he could feel his pulse, and murmured calmly.

“I just… I think it’s my fault too.”

He thought he would sob uncontrollably if the day ever came when he confessed to someone, but not a single tear fell. He was surprised that he only felt relieved. He felt as if he were becoming like Seo Hae-young, who spoke of others’ misfortunes with such indifference. Staring intently at the veranda where the wood grain was clearly etched, Hae-won spat out the regret that had taken root in his mind at some point.

“If I had died with my dad… then it would have ended at just the right place. It would’ve been good for Hae-young, and good for me…”

Since Seo Hae-young was tender back then, he might have taken care of the funeral. Go Tae-gyeom and Joo Hyun-woo would have shed at least one tear for a friend, and how much would Joo Hyun-jeong have pitied him? Having left a regret only now, long after missing the right time, Hae-won looked up at the sky that had grown dark and put strength into his knees.

“I think Hae-young is coming… thank you for this…”

He bowed his head and turned around. Because the silence was heavy, he deliberately didn’t check Gi-tae’s expression. Anyone would be bewildered if someone suddenly showed up and poured out their past without a word of preamble. Whether that face held disgust or was soaked in pity, neither seemed particularly welcome, so he dragged his feet as he left through the main gate.

Fortunately, Gi-tae neither followed nor stopped him. He might have thought it was a made-up story. If he thought so, Hae-won was only grateful. The feeling of unilaterally vomiting his inner thoughts to someone who wouldn’t go around blabbing about it felt reasonably okay.

* * *

As he turned the corner of the alley where the streetlights were lit, Hae-won exhaled the breath he had been holding. White breath scattered. As he turned the corner, the memories he had confessed evaporated, leaving only a few fragments, like the vanishing breath. His mind was dizzy, as if he were facing lights flashing incessantly right before his eyes. Just as he began to wonder in what state of mind he had conversed with Gi-tae, his churning stomach flipped violently. Leaning against a corner by a telephone pole just before his house, Hae-won gripped the wall and dry-heaved before collapsing powerlessly.

“Ugh…! Ack…”

Tangerines that had fallen out of the bag sprawled on the road rolled down the slope. Pressing his forehead against the cracked cement floor, Hae-won hugged his stomach, which hurt as if something sharp were gouging it, and vomited things that weren’t there. It felt as if he were wringing out his stomach with both hands. Tears pooling in the corners of his eyes fell drop by drop, leaving dark stains on the gray cement. Even as he covered his mouth and tried to swallow his saliva, the nausea that wouldn’t subside made his scrawny upper body heave. Struggling in agony, he covered his nose and held his breath entirely. He trapped his breath in his own palms, just as Gi-tae and Seo Hae-young had done for him.

Then, from afar, the sound of footsteps treading the alleyway could be heard. The steps passed by Hae-won, who was curled up in the corner of the alley swallowed by darkness, and disappeared into the open main gate. Six steps—exactly after that, a loud noise erupted. The sound of someone frantically searching for something, the sound of glass shards mixing, the sound of clicking open, and the sound of heels striking the veranda were heard vividly, and the voice calling “Hae-won! Yoon Hae-won!” spread through the night-fallen alley.

“Huu, hugh…”

He rubbed his forehead against the rough surface. The more the sounds from inside held urgency, the more the voice calling his name held misery, the more the nausea subsided. Gathering his trembling limbs with difficulty and leaning against the wall, Hae-won did not rush to the rampaging Seo Hae-young, but instead hugged his dust-covered knees. Reality became visible through his flashing vision.

“Ah…”

Seo Hae-young is crazy. He must be crazy. Otherwise, there was no way he would be making such a scene.

Where did the Seo Hae-young he loved go? Had he loved something wrong from the start, or had something changed Seo Hae-young? When he thought he hoped he wouldn’t get tired of him, the man treated him cruelly; and when he begged him to please get tired of him, the man made him neither dead nor alive.

Burying his face in his knees, Hae-won left the suffering Seo Hae-young alone. Suppressing the urge to run to him immediately, he gripped his forearms. Even if he couldn’t make him cry and beg, it seemed he had learned how to make him suffer.

“…Yoon Hae-won?”

After about ten minutes of suppressing his urges while tearing at his hair, he looked up and saw Seo Hae-young dimly as he burst out of the main gate. He was standing facing the slope where the tangerines had rolled, so his face wasn’t visible, but judging by his heavily heaving shoulders, he seemed out of breath.

He thought Seo Hae-young would turn around soon, but suddenly, Seo Hae-young sprinted down the steep slope. The sight of him running as if chasing something was eerie. Releasing the arms that had been hugging his knees, Hae-won watched the receding back and stood up, leaning against the wall. Only now did the soles of his feet begin to sting, and he followed, limping. His body, unable to stay upright, swayed back and forth, and his throat, too damaged to call a name, was filled with the sound of wheezing breath.

Every time he stepped down the ledge that served as stairs, his knees buckled and the surroundings spun dizzily. As he passed the closed supermarket in a neighborhood where people prepared for bed as the sun set, it felt as if the two of them were playing hide-and-seek in a place where no one else was. For Hae-won, who had never been the seeker, just chasing was overwhelming, and he could hardly close the distance.

“Haa, ha….”

When he finally emerged from the alleyways, the winter sea stretched out, blocking any path of escape. Facing the pitch-black ocean where waves surged violently, Seo Hae-young paused for a moment. He looked around, and the instant his gaze landed on a certain corner, he ran toward it as if possessed. Why is he going there? Hae-won’s wet eyes darted rapidly. Leaping over a waist-high curb, Seo Hae-young strode across the land—a stretch of coarse gravel unsuitable for a beach. …Why is he going there? It was the very sea Hwang had repeatedly warned him not to enter because it was dangerous.

“Hae-young, Hae-young!”

He screamed urgently, but the waves swallowed his unsightly voice. Crossing the path where the cold wind blew fiercely, Hae-won rested his chin on his hand and caught his breath. The rocks exposing their jagged edges were black, the water was black, and the sky was black. Fear surged within him. Water where his feet couldn’t touch the bottom had always been terrifying. That was why he had never once dipped a foot into that sea.

Calling out to the receding figure of Seo Hae-young, he rested his bruised knee against his chin. The anxiously fluttering wind tore through his hair, soaking it with moisture. His breathing grew labored. Below his chin, the pile of rocks looked exactly like a cliff. Just as he hesitantly took a step.

“Yoon Hae-won—!”

A thunderous shout rang out, echoing in his head. But the direction was the complete opposite. Seo Hae-young was heading toward the ink-black sea. Without hesitation, Hae-won stepped forward.

The sea breeze felt like a rake, and the seawater crashing between the pebbles was violent. His fingers, gripping the damp rocks, throbbed. His slipper slipped and fell into a crevice, and his torn sole stepped onto the cold surface.

“Augh….”

The sensation of a long wound splitting sent a stinging prick through his shin. He wanted to collapse right then and there, but he didn’t even have time to hurt. Seo Hae-young was nowhere to be seen. Feeling his way across the pebbles with his toes until he fully reached the shore, Hae-won stumbled toward the crashing waves. He climbed over waist-high rocks and detoured around ones higher than his shoulders; by the time he reached the spot where Seo Hae-young had vanished, his head spun. Through his blurred vision, he saw a back heading toward the place where the wind began to scratch the cheeks. Seo Hae-young was wading into the vast ocean, submerged up to his thighs, and the ripples spreading from him sparkled eerily, reflecting the dim light of a distant streetlamp.

“Seo Hae-young! Hae-young!”

No matter how loudly he called until his throat burst, his cries didn’t reach. Hurrying across the pebble field, Hae-won fell forward the moment he stepped on a sudden dip in the terrain. With a gasp, the ice-cold seawater soaked through his loosely knit sweater, clinging to his skin. The sea, swallowing his knees in an instant, violently threw off his balance, and screams of pain erupted from every wounded part of his body.

Scrambling across the floor littered with sharp stones, Hae-won forced himself up, falling, rising, falling and rising again as he chased after Seo Hae-young. Without the mental capacity to identify what was sliding around his ankles in the current, he closed the distance by gripping the uneven rocks. By the time it became a struggle even to lift his feet against the waves pushing him back toward the beach, the seawater was sloshing at his waist.

Only then did a sudden terror seize him. Deep water. He didn’t know how to swim at all, and any good memories of it had long since faded. Memories of the villa—which were closer to torture than diving—resurfaced, and his chilled muscles stiffened. Eyelashes heavy with tears flickered. Seo Hae-young appeared clearly, then became a blurred smudge again. Like someone possessed by a water ghost, the figure disappearing into the waves looked as if he would vanish into the sea forever.

Hae-young… Hae-young, Seo Hae-young.

The voice he murmured to himself scattered before it could even reach his ears, but his stiff legs began to move. He pushed forward through the water that swallowed his lower abdomen, his navel, and his solar plexus. As he hurried to catch up, the sea deepened further, splashing against his chest. Wading through the water where the bottom could drop out at any moment, Hae-won hauled himself up onto a high reef. As he struggled to lift his feet, which kept slipping on the slick surface, a dizzying chill enveloped him.

His pants, soaked and clinging to his legs, tore against sharp edges, leaving scratches, and barnacles clinging to the surface hammered by the waves tore at the skin of his palms. There was no special meaning in gripping the sloping reef with both hands to move his body. It certainly wasn’t something that could be grandly packaged as a sense of justice or love. He had followed instinctively, and it was only natural. He could no longer deny Seo Hae-young’s words—that he wouldn’t be able to go anywhere without him. The moment the breath escaping his lips became rougher than ever, he finally caught up to Seo Hae-young.

“Hugh…!”

The moment his hand, extended because he couldn’t bear to give him to the sea, grabbed a wet shoulder, his foot on the reef slipped. Barely leaning his back against a rock rounded by long years of erosion, Hae-won urgently reached out with trembling hands to embrace the body moving away. The water, risen to his chest, helped him bind Seo Hae-young without needing much strength.

“Haa, ah….”

Burying his face between the shoulder blades of the staggering Seo Hae-young, Hae-won wrapped both arms around the broad chest. A heart beating far faster than usual was held within his worn palms. Standing upright and motionless, Seo Hae-young was still staring at the horizon where the sky and sea met.

“…Hae-young.”

His lips, pronouncing the word as if letting it slip, brushed against the wet clothing. Hae-won pressed closer to the unresponsive Seo Hae-young. The skin that would burn hot in the summer was as cold as a corpse, sending an unpleasant shiver through him. Fearing the Seo Hae-young who didn’t look back as if he couldn’t hear anything, Hae-won rubbed his feverish forehead against the other’s back.

By the time his long hair became tangled and his lips turned blue, he felt fingers fumbling over the back of his hand. The hand that had been wandering between the bony back of his hand and his fingers gripped his wrist painfully. The moment he winced and shrugged his shoulders with a groan, a small wave created by the movement wet his chin. The waist of another person touched his knees, which were precariously perched on the rock. He closed his eyes to avoid the droplets splashing his cheeks, and when he opened them, he saw Seo Hae-young, who had readjusted his grip on the wrist.

It felt as if the flesh and bone would be crushed within the large hand. However, no plea to let go came out. After scrutinizing the face he had seen yesterday and today—a face he should have grown tired of—he saw that the way he looked back at the endless sea seemed uncharacteristically confused, so Hae-won gave him a moment of time.

Every time he turned his head, droplets hanging from the tips of his black hair sparkled and scattered. At the behavior that seemed to be searching for something, the fingertips where blood wasn’t flowing began to tingle. As Hae-won watched the moonlight settle on Seo Hae-young’s shoulder, he slowly looked up, and finally, their gazes locked.

Without any excuse or explanation, Seo Hae-young gazed quietly at his face. The deep, dark gaze was suffocating just to look at. A round droplet of water traced a line that was beautiful but not fragile, falling from the tip of his chin. The wet man looked both pathetic and eerie, making it impossible to look away. Just as he wanted to embrace him yet also wanted to flee, twisting his captured wrist, the cunning Seo Hae-young suddenly pulled him into a tight embrace.

“Where did you go….”

Contrary to the childlike whining, the arms tightening around his waist were stronger than anyone’s. It was warm and it hurt. Looking out at the silent sea, Hae-won lifted his wrist, marked with red finger-prints, to embrace Seo Hae-young’s shoulder and stroke his hair. As the warmth blooming between their clinging bodies calmed the slight tremors, he put more strength into the hand stroking the round back of the head. His blurred focus landed on the small waves breaking against the reef. The voice coming from his parted lips didn’t feel like his own.

“Why are you here?”

“Because you called me.”

A chill crept up the back of his neck, and a vague suspicion solidified into certainty. Seo Hae-young was crazy. He had to be crazy. There were only two of them here from the start. What on earth was Seo Hae-young seeing and hearing?

“Because you keep fucking… running away, so I came to catch you.”

Contrary to the voice pouring softly against his chest, the arms tightening as if to break his waist were trembling slightly. Finally, Seo Hae-young was suffering. His tongue was parched and his head was dizzy. His heart pounded so hard it would be vividly transmitted to Seo Hae-young, whose ear was pressed against his chest. He had achieved his goal, but he wasn’t happy. The past he had calmly poured out to Gi-tae held him back. Pain cannot be measured by weight, but not yet… they were not yet equal.

Then, an irresistible impulse boiled over. He felt as if someone was urgently chasing him from behind. He was anxious and uneasy. Perhaps the water ghost that had possessed Seo Hae-young had come for him as well. Looking around the space hidden by the reef in the late night sea where no one would find them, Hae-won lifted the arms wrapped around his shoulders and hugged Seo Hae-young’s head tightly.

Failed sprints, failed pleas, failed revenge. The moments where he had chipped away at Seo Hae-young but failed to break him screamed while trapped in the villa. Hae-won was helplessly swept away by those screams. Buried in the drug’s effect that flickered out his reason, in fear, and in depression, Hae-won let his back slide off the reef without letting go of the head in his arms. It was a very brief moment, an instant no one could prepare for.

“Hah, ha….”

The protruding edge of a rock scratched the skin of his back, leaving a wound, and a wave that suddenly changed direction slammed against the reef. Seo Hae-young’s airway entered his embrace.

“Mmph…!”

It was Seo Hae-young who had fallen into the water, but Hae-won suffered as if he were the one drowning. Even though he couldn’t breathe, as if he had been kicked hard in the stomach, he forced himself to hold on. Suddenly submerged in the black sea, Seo Hae-young gripped his forearms. Even in the grip strong enough to break them, Hae-won did not release the arms holding the head, stepping on the edge of the underwater rock that kept slipping. The resulting spray drenched his eyes, nose, and forehead, flowing into his throat. He barely managed to lift his head, but the water that had swallowed him up to his neck surged into his mouth. Closing his eyes tight, Hae-won counted in his head.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.

“Sorry, I’m sorry…. I, I have to do this too….”

Just holding onto the body resisting to rise to the surface made all his muscles tingle. As the numbers increased, and the time he stole the breath lengthened, the struggling of Seo Hae-young in his arms grew more intense. However, the arms of Hae-won—who occasionally dropped things and more often trembled—did not let Seo Hae-young go. Perhaps there had been help from the other party. To the point where it felt as if he wasn’t resisting, Seo Hae-young rebelled only with the strength he could endure. This made Hae-won feel much more at ease, and at the same time, much sadder.

Twenty, twenty-five, thirty, forty.

As the numbers grew well beyond two digits, the resistance that had been creating ripples subsided. What prevented him from releasing the arms that had been collided and torn enough to leave deep black bruises was a clumsy resistance created by a worn-out desire for revenge, lost resentment, fear of the future, and unbearable guilt all tied together. Hae-won killed Seo Hae-young while looking at the bright moon.

Fifty-one, fifty-two, fifty-three.

“I’m sorry…. I’m sorry, Hae-young….”

The lips murmuring the apology trembled. By the time he was no longer aware of the speed at which he was counting the increasing numbers, the hand that had been gripping his thigh slowly loosened, and not even a single air bubble rose. The sound of his heart echoed like an explosion.

Hwak—! Bursting out the breath he had been holding, Hae-won put strength into his trembling legs and hauled his body up. His ragged breathing spoke of excitement and confusion. He wasn’t happy at all, not even a little. The moon hanging in the cloudy sky split into two or three pieces, and he suddenly snapped back to his senses. And he began to realize what he had just done. Hurriedly embracing Seo Hae-young’s waist, Hae-won gasped and buried his face in the cold shoulder. His feet, scraped and pierced by the rocks, spread bloodstains into the black sea.

“Ah, Hae-young…. Huh, Hae-young, Hae-young…. Sorry, sorry….”

He had finally done it. For this act, he would have no excuse even if he were beaten. Now it was Seo Hae-young’s turn to let out a deep sigh and ask if it had been fun. And then he would strike his cheek with a hand covering his face.

“What do I do, Hae-young. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…. I, I did wrong. I’m sorry, gasp, I, I didn’t mean for this to happen, not like this. This is….”

Driven by the instinct to be beaten as little as possible, Hae-won repeatedly murmured apologies, rubbing his forehead against the shoulder. But something was wrong. The arms that were limp and occasionally tapped his thigh were only chilly, and not a single gentle curse was heard. Ten seconds, twenty seconds… as time passed, his tightly closed lips parted on their own.

Huh?

His bloodshot eyes rolled. The hand submerged in water was pale, and instead of a fierce touch, wet hair tickled his cheek. The moment he wondered why this was happening, a chill ran down his spine. The head resting on his shoulder was heavy, but no movement was felt at all. His limbs, which had been frozen stiff, soon began to tremble uncontrollably. His upper and lower teeth clattered together, and his shoulders winced.

“…Hae-young?”

No answer came. While he was just trembling, lacking the confidence to check, a hallucination echoed from somewhere as if congratulating him.

‘Can’t you love me?’

“Huk…!”

Startled, Hae-won rubbed his ears frantically. A single person’s voice tore through the sound of his heartbeat and poured in, making him urgently cover his ears. But he couldn’t block the hallucinations that kept flooding in with only his dry palms.

I was clean. Just me. So whose fault is it? You probably ate delicious food, went out to play, kissed, and had sex too. I keep seeing you. I don’t want to, but I keep, keep seeing you. Hae-won rubbed his ears as if tearing them. I did it because I was hurt. I was so fucking miserable. It was noisy. Can’t you love me? I must have ruined everything. I didn’t mean for this to happen. I didn’t know. I want to be like before. His distorted lips parted. Can’t, you, love, me? A scream erupted.

Hae-won screamed while embracing the waist, and apologized even while gasping and sobbing. The conclusion brought by a short revenge was a terrifyingly cold chill. The price for the moment he thought he would become comfortable, that they would become equal, was an unbearable sense of sin.

But, whose revenge was it for? The target was unclear. Haa, haa… His exhaled breath touched the broad shoulders. For a moment, the sea that had become the means to kill Seo Hae-young strangled his own neck. Pushing away the piles of sand beneath his feet, he clung to the reef, but he only sank as if something were pressing down on his head. He was terrified of the unpredictable emotions. Now, the one he feared was not Seo Hae-young, but himself.

“Ah…, ah….”

A despair that overcame buoyancy dragged him down into the pitch-black sea. Simultaneously, a strong force pressed down on his shoulders. Was it Seo Hae-young? He could see nothing. Trapped in a tiny space, Hae-won was consumed by a fear that he would die if he took just one more step, unable to feel anything. Then, a wave that stole his remaining strength crashed down, and the seabed he was stepping on collapsed. As the soft ground vanished, Hae-won lost his place to stand.

* * *

This is probably a bad dream. He had been sleeping all day today, and in a little while, Seo Hae-young, with a bowl of porridge by his side, would support his upper body and wake him up. After swallowing a handful of mysterious medicine, he would lean into the embrace that touched his cheek and reflect on the past, living day by day with a thread-like consolation, welcoming a day where he would harbor the faint hope that a day would come when they would look at each other and smile.

If asked if he could envision a happy future after being treated like that, he could only answer that he was born stupid to begin with. With no decent talent and no intelligence, where would the blood left by his father, who eventually died on the street, go? Dreaming vain dreams only to end in despair, and instead of overcoming it, he lived immersed in alcohol—the easiest and fastest way to reach happiness among what he had—so he would likely walk a similar path. Trapped in an environment where he had no choice but to love Seo Hae-young, he would find the easiest and fastest way to become happy. Perhaps one day, when he opens his eyes…. Then….

Hae-won.

As his body, stiff as a stone, was sucked in, Hae-won heard a call—whether it was an auditory hallucination or not remained ambiguous. The body he had been clinging to slipped away softly. Bubbles surged from his gasping mouth, flying toward the moonlit surface of the water. The salt-laden sea stung his narrow-open eyes. Gazing at the shimmering shadows, Hae-won sank deeper than the bottom of the pool Seo Hae-young had once taken him to. The pressure on his throat forced his eyelids down. As he closed his eyes, the vast, dark ocean overwhelmed him.

He sank and sank further. True to the stories that even skilled fishermen avoided this area, the seabed below the sheer cliffs was profoundly deep.

In the dark underwater where one could not distinguish an inch ahead, Hae-won saw the young Seo Hae-young, who had suited the clear waters so well. Seo Hae-young, cutting through currents warmed by sunlight pouring from a transparent, grid-patterned ceiling, swimming far away. He had fallen for that free and unrestrained appearance without hesitation, only to be severely burned, as if he had held a flame in his palm.

For three years, he had counted himself a sinner while staring at the burns etched into his palms. The times when agony bred more agony flashed by at high speed. Futile and vain hours blocked his eyes, nose, and mouth.

He was dying. It was the moment he realized this was not a dream. Fortunately, he had no desire to survive. While being sucked in, unaware of what was touching his slowly falling body, something gripped him firmly. He tried to shake it off, but his waterlogged limbs wouldn’t budge. His consciousness blurred.

Finally, when death reached his doorstep, Hae-won heard a round song. It was a voice that stole his senses, like the clamorous cry of cicadas that once pierced his ears. A sorrowful and desolate call echoed from a distant place, then stepped closer and closer.

Hae-won. Hae-won.

His crushed chest ached.

Yoon Hae-won, Hae-won.

Even though he knew it was his name, it felt somehow unsettling. The voice, devoid of excitement or playfulness, was as desperate as a wail. Looking back at his short life, Hae-won searched for someone who would call his name with such longing. He pushed through familiar neighborhoods and strange places, through countless people whose faces he couldn’t remember, and when he finally arrived at one person, reddish lips parted and called his name in a clear voice.

“Yoon Hae-won!”

The booming voice seized his entire body and pulled him back.

“Keuh…!”

The seawater pooled in his throat burst out. Gasping for air with a metallic rasp, Hae-won choked and writhed, unable to endure the stinging eyes and the agonizing, tearing pain in his lungs. A high-pitched ringing in his water-filled ears shook his head. As his upper body heaved with violent coughing, the hand resting on his chest fell away. His back scraped against the shifting pebbles, but regaining his breath came first. Just as he let out dry coughs that turned his face bright red, before he could even process the situation, he saw a flash of fire before his eyes.

“Kup… ugh!”

His head snapped to the side, and his cheek was crushed against the smooth pebbles. No sooner had he registered the bitter taste of blood on his tongue than he was struck on the opposite cheek.

“Fuck, how could you…”

Flesh was crushed, the inside of his mouth tore open, and his tongue, scratched by a canine tooth, filled with blood. A palm struck him again, and blood burst from his straight nose. With blood spreading to his lips and his brows furrowed, Hae-won burst into tears while enduring the random onslaught of violence.

“Ah…! Ugh…”

The pain was so intense that he couldn’t even feel the wounds etched into his palms and soles. Simultaneously, his dying senses revived as if set on fire. As the memories of what he had done to Seo Hae-young and the mindset with which he had sunk surfaced in detail, the fierce blows were no longer frightening.

Only after being violently pinned down did his trembling hand twitch, as if about to form a fist. Despite the tremor that seemed to want to crush his face entirely, Hae-won buried his face in the palm lingering near his cheek and rubbed against it with difficulty. It was Hae-young. It was Seo Hae-young. The imperfect warmth, contrasting with the cold sea, was so welcome that he wanted to cling closer, but the palm pulled away as if he shouldn’t. Just as he could only shed tears because his salt-stung eyes wouldn’t open, a cold demand reached him.

“Hit me. You hit me too. That’s how it should be.”

His wrist, sprawled on the pebbles, was pulled up. His curled fingertips tapped against his wounded cheek and then slid away powerlessly. As his blurred vision cleared, the man pinning him down flickered as a pale silhouette.

With a voice that sounded like he was scraping his damaged throat to shout, Seo Hae-young appeared, drenched in clothes, hair, and pale skin, wearing the same expression he had seen last summer. Lifting Hae-won’s limp arm to make him strike his own cheek, Seo Hae-young continued this futile act, steeped in a despair that even he did not understand.

“You even tried to kill me, so you can’t even hit me?”

“Ugh, haah…”

He wanted to say it wasn’t like that, but all that came from his throat, blocked by a scratchy sensation, were boiling groans. Hae-won fumbled up toward the hand pressing his shoulder, tugging at the soaked sleeve while shaking his head. His mind was hazy from the number of blows he had received. The limp, horizontal shaking of his head caused a dizziness that rocked his brain. Letting out a scoff of disbelief, Seo Hae-young dropped the hand that couldn’t even land a single blow and gripped both of Hae-won’s shoulders.

“Do you hate me that much? Want to kill me? Then you should have held me down until I died, you fucker.”

“Ah, hah… Hae, Hae-young…”

“Trying to die again? Were you going to do that shit again, leaving me behind?”

Every time his upper body shook, his shoulder blades and the back of his head thudded against the pebble field. Hae-won, who found it difficult to move even a fingertip, struggled to grasp the exact reason for Seo Hae-young’s anger. It seemed he was angry that Hae-won had tried to kill him, or perhaps he was screaming because Hae-won had tried to die without even attempting to swim. Whatever the reason, the face stained with betrayal looked as if he had completely lost his reason.

“How could you… to me…”

Another wave crashed. The pebbles rattled and rolled, creating a sound that was tedious yet familiar to Seo Hae-young. It was the noise that had rolled in his ears for a year. A drop of water fell from the tip of his black hair, cutting across a pale cheek. Clenching his teeth so hard his jaw ached, Seo Hae-young used all his strength to keep from striking the gasping Hae-won. Because of that, the grip on his shoulders grew even tighter.

Unable to find the real one among the many voices loudly calling his name, he had chased Hae-won as he disappeared into the backyard; he had chased Hae-won as he ran around the corner; he had chased Hae-won as he entered the sea. Forgetting facts like the way he limped slightly or that he couldn’t swim, he had been obsessed only with catching the sobbing, fleeing Hae-won. Now, having rescued him from a hallucination where everything was the sea and everything was Yoon Hae-won, he couldn’t be like this.

This was an absurd story. It was not only unrealistic but something he had never even imagined. Yoon Hae-won, who had said he wished he were dead but couldn’t lay a single finger on him, couldn’t be like this. He shouldn’t have denied him with such blatant hatred. A surge of betrayal welled up—the betrayal of the Hae-won who had stayed silently in his arms while swallowing the crashing seawater, who had hugged him frantically while begging for forgiveness, and who had made him hesitate to act even while leaning on his shoulder to regain his breath. He couldn’t believe the sight of him sinking as if he deserved to die after doing such things. Whether he hated him enough to want to kill him, or whether he hated being with him even if it meant dying. Seo Hae-young could not escape the embrace that had held his own head and shoved it into the water, nor could he escape the moment he had snatched the blackening, sinking Hae-won.

“Ah…”

Uncontrollable anger boiled over, making his eyes burn hot. Looking down at Hae-won, who was panting and bleeding from the nose, Seo Hae-young faced a doubt he could not comprehend.

“Why… why do you hate me?”

Why would he hate me? Why. Why would Yoon Hae-won?

He muttered the words repeatedly and dropped his head. He didn’t know what to do with the Hae-won who inevitably made his hand rise, nor did he know what to do with his own eyes that found the sight of the trembling, fearful boy lovely. It wasn’t easy to find a middle ground between these polar opposite emotions, so he couldn’t even hear the whisper Hae-won offered in a hoarse voice. A long sigh escaped.

The hand that had released the shoulder, where the bone structure was clearly felt, moved along the collarbone toward the neck. Gripping the long neck with both hands, Seo Hae-young stared intently at Hae-won, whose tear-filled eyes were wide open, and parted his lips.

“If you hate me, then… what should I do. I like you. I fucking love you, so what am I supposed to do?”

“Heugh, ugh…”

Hands devoid of strength remained curved, clutching his windpipe. The hands, resting without being painful or heavy, trembled violently. Realizing there was no intention to harm him, Hae-won, who had been urgently tugging at the forearm sleeve, stopped resisting. Water droplets fell on his burning cheeks and aching eyelids, but he couldn’t close his eyes. The thick emotions pouring from Seo Hae-young’s lips, heavier than water droplets, writhed vividly as if they could be touched.

“I like you. I loved you. Fuck, I guess I kept loving you. I didn’t know, but I guess I did. But fuck, you betrayed me first. You shouldn’t have done that. Not anyone else, but you… I cherished you so much, and you…”

Pinning down the startled Hae-won, Seo Hae-young felt that this situation was simply unfair. Everything was utterly incomprehensible.

He had done his best. Even if he couldn’t understand, he did everything he possibly could. To shake the gradually wavering Hae-won from the roots, he desperately repeated the moments Yoon Hae-won had loved. He asked for his opinion kindly, let things slide generously, and helped him with everything. He traced back memories so faint that there was nothing left to give, dragging out the image of his past self.

“I’m scared, Hae-won. I’m scared that you… that you died back then, and I’m living with something strange. I’m fucking terrified. You’re alive. Right? I’m confused. I don’t know.”

He didn’t know how much he had loved him. He thought he loved the smooth cheeks, the bridge of the nose that naturally wrinkled when he smiled, and the earlobes that turned red from time to time. He thought he loved the way he walked, dragging the heels of his shoes, and the scent that was the same as his own. He thought he loved the height that required him to lower his head slightly to meet his eyes, and the body that wasn’t entirely thin. He thought he loved the light impulses Yoon Hae-won gave, and the corresponding comfort and stability.

“Love me. You can do it. It’s not hard.”

Whenever Yoon Hae-won tapped on his phone, he wanted to snatch it and throw it away. He wanted to delete every number in the contacts except his own, and he wanted himself to be the only one exchanging messages. He wondered who he talked to and what kind of life he led while visiting all sorts of shops to earn tuition. While circling around him, he called out to the Yoon Hae-won who never approached first, and even while visiting him, he didn’t know what he wanted. He simply waited quietly. The time he spent waiting without knowing what he was waiting for—that was probably love.

“You know… can’t you just look at me? Just endure it a bit. You can do that. You keep saying you want to die, and when you do that, I want to kill you too. You can’t live without me. I’m the same.”

He had wanted to date Yoon Hae-won. Those ticklish things, like binding each other so they wouldn’t be a single inch apart.

He didn’t think it was a difficult task. He just had to carefully cultivate the environment where Yoon Hae-won lived and what he saw. If he met only a limited number of people in a limited space, Hae-won would eventually realize there was no other way. However, the waiting until today had been too long, and the anxiety and urgency gripped in both hands kept making him cross the line. Knowing it was wrong and understanding it, yet unable to empathize, Seo Hae-young confessed the reality he had ignored to the Hae-won who wouldn’t go as he wished.

“I’m not sane. It’s fucked up. I don’t know what to do.”

The palm covering the neck straightened and stroked the skin. The hand that had climbed up the jaw clumsily caressed the bright red cheek. The left hand, stitched together and hideously scarred, swept over the eyes that had forgotten how to blink.

Hae-won, who reflexively closed and then opened his eyes, could not steady his trembling body. Seo Hae-young’s inner thoughts, which rushed in before he could dwell on them—disjointed words with a firm theme—were heard clearly, making it impossible to pretend he hadn’t heard. Cupping his cheeks with both hands, Seo Hae-young asked, “Hmm?” as if telling him to say something, gently shaking his face, but Hae-won couldn’t utter a word. Even after being asked several times, he had never given the right answer; now that he was as weak as could be, what on earth was he supposed to do…

“Hae-won.”

The hand of Seo Hae-young, who called his name in a low voice, fell away from his cheek. The unsightly left hand moved toward a spot where nail marks had not yet healed. The imperfect index finger bent, and the neatly trimmed nail, which could not be a weapon, dug into the skin. Once, twice, three times… the wound that hadn’t healed for days broke open again, holding droplets of blood. Under the streetlight that flickered and returned to a pale light, Hae-won saw the lowest and weakest side of Seo Hae-young, who was forcibly parting the skin and scratching at the tender flesh.

“It hurts. It’s hard, Hae-won.”

The strongly surging waves stirred the pebbles and covered his frozen legs. From the sight of him pleading without once bowing his head, from the sight of him firmly believing that the most selfish and arrogant way was the right one, a sense of pity bloomed. Gripping and pulling the arm that was exerting enough force to tear the skin, Hae-won, at some point, felt a surge of sympathy for Seo Hae-young, failing to realize his own position. Seo Hae-young, who was scratching his own face while Hae-won had cheeks stained red and lips smeared with blood from being hit, seemed pitiful. Even though he knew he shouldn’t, it was an irresistible attraction.

Just as Seo Hae-young didn’t know how to apologize properly, Hae-won didn’t know how to be coldly angry, and neither of them knew how to return to the past.

That’s why he wanted to beg, crying, saying that everything was his fault, so please don’t do that. What Seo Hae-young had planted in his mind over a long time was deeper and firmer than expected, destroying the right path and leaving only the road leading to Seo Hae-young. However, on the other side, the pitch-black past was ringing an alarm.

Driven into a dead end, Hae-won chuckled. A dizziness that made him want to lose his mind washed over him. He wanted to go crazy just like this, forget the past entirely, and walk the easiest and fastest path to happiness. Ah, actually, he wanted to run away.

When the streetlight, which frequently went out, flickered once more.

A pitch-black shadow stepped over the chin and hopped down the sloping rock. Large pebbles crumbled underfoot, letting out a loud noise. Step by step, the footsteps drew closer rapidly, and the weight of Seo Hae-young, who had been pushing his shoulder, disappeared. Hae-won, lying on the pebble field, knew who the person pulling him up by the arm was. However, because he hadn’t expected any interference, he twisted his ankle several times while being dragged along the gentle slope. Turning his upper body, which swayed as if he were about to collapse, Hae-won met a pair of eerie eyes.

The clean whites were blood-red, as if they held blood. The gaze, which said he would kill him if he didn’t return immediately, was like a headless chicken that occasionally appeared in his dreams—as if a stream of blood from being hung upside down had pooled in the retinas—cutting through his wrists and ankles with betrayal and resentment. While being dragged by a hot grip on his forearm, a desolate voice echoed over the waves.

It hurts, Hae-won… It hurts. Hae-won. Come to me. You have no one but me…

Hae-won did not go back. To be precise, he could not go back. And so, for the first time in his life, he abandoned Seo Hae-young. Not that he was running away.

The gaze, shining brilliantly and blood-red as if filled with tears of blood, followed him to a place where it shouldn’t have been visible. Hae-won, who was being led with knees that buckled and snapped, fell backward the moment he entered the alley. Not even a scream came out. His limbs, frozen cold by the seawater, trembled and convulsed. Things he didn’t want to see and didn’t want to recall swirled around. Gi-tae’s face, which had become a warehouse where all his hidden secrets were dumped, flickered, then bubbled inside the ears that had absorbed Seo Hae-young’s confession. Hae-won lost consciousness while staring at his own hands and feet, which had been hacked off, revealing bright red cross-sections.

I liked him first, and I think I still like him.

I recalled the sentence added like a postscript, bringing the trivial conversation to an end. I also remembered the expression Gi-tae wore at that moment. One filled with contempt, as if asking how I could possibly do such a thing…….