By Zephyria 
Just then, Min-gyu pulled the phone from his pocket. After checking the screen, Min-gyu looked at Yi-ho with a pitiful expression.
“I have to take this call.”
“Okay. Do you want to order after you get back?”
“No. Um… please order a peppermint tea for me.”
When Yi-ho looked at him quizzically, he curled the corners of his mouth upward.
“Song-i is worrying about me.”
Whether it truly was an urgent call or not, he soon strode through the crowd toward the exit. In the process, he naturally caught the eyes of many people, exchanging light nods with a few as he passed.
Only after Min-gyu’s back had completely vanished from sight did Yi-ho trudge over to the counter and join the line. Of all things, the people who had just greeted Min-gyu ended up behind him. The topic of conversation was, naturally, the man who had left such a strong impression.
“The Marketing Team Leader is sparkling today, as always.”
“I heard he’s in a happy relationship.”
“It looks like he met his partner for lunch today, right? He always goes out for meals and then comes back.”
While the talk of Min-gyu continued, Yi-ho’s fingertips fidgeted busily. He pretended to look forward, but his ears were wide open toward the people behind him.
“Next person, please?”
“Ah, yes.”
His clumsy eavesdropping proved useless as Yi-ho had to step forward to the counter.
“Um, an iced americano and a peppermint tea….”
“Right. He must be in a bad mood today; I hope he can shake it off since he’s meeting his partner.”
“Why? Did something happen?”
“The project he’s in charge of this time is a bit….”
“Would you like the peppermint tea hot or iced? …Customer?”
“Ah, sorry. Um… hot, please….”
As if accustomed to dealing with absent-minded customers, the clerk took the card, swiped it, and handed Yi-ho a buzzer and his card. The conversation that had been drifting over as the next customers were called cut off. However, Yi-ho had heard everything from behind while he was ordering.
‘I guess the higher-ups are nagging him a lot. The rumors have spread everywhere. If he brings out the emotion, they shit on that; if he makes the copy strong, they shit on that too. They reject everything while demanding it be antique yet modern, and flashy yet simple. Even the design team tied to the same project is screaming in agony.’
‘I mean, Team Leader Cha has great taste, they should just leave him alone.’
Standing in a corner, Yi-ho gripped the buzzer tightly. He peeked toward the exit Min-gyu had left through. There was no sign of him. He hadn’t shown any sign of it for the past few days….
In front of him, he had seemed happy the whole time. Today, too—playing pranks, and even stealing a quick kiss on the cheek when the car had momentarily stopped.
“…….”
His gaze, which had been drifting toward the exit, shifted back to the counter. The lunch rush had ended, and most people in the cafe were now waiting for their pickups. Once the front of the counter cleared, a small sign in front of the POS system—which he hadn’t noticed before—caught his eye. The grand revival of last year’s Consumer Award #1 drink…
Ah.
Suddenly, Yi-ho rushed toward the counter. Then, as if possessed, he placed an order.
“A Raw Melon Cream Smoothie. One more, please.”
“Shall I give you a buzzer for that as well?”
“…Yes.”
A short while later, Yi-ho received three drinks. His americano, a hot peppermint tea, and a light green, sweet-looking beverage.
Placing the three drinks on a corner table, Yi-ho kept his eyes fixed on the cafe entrance. Just as lunch hour was nearly over, Min-gyu appeared at the door. Entering with a somewhat stiff expression, he pressed his face with his knuckles for a moment before returning to the expression Yi-ho knew and looking around the cafe. As soon as his eyes met Yi-ho’s in the corner seat, he raised an eyebrow and smiled. Min-gyu tilted his head, looking at the unfamiliar smoothie on the table.
“What is this?”
“It’s for Team Leader Cha to have two.”
Yi-ho pushed the drinks toward him.
“Because it’s been hard for you.”
“Oh…?”
Min-gyu blinked as if surprised. Instead of a meaningless denial, he asked candidly.
“What’s this, Team Leader Song? How did you know?”
“I have my ways.”
“What are your ways?”
“It’s a secret.”
“Hah.”
Of course, he wouldn’t have known if he hadn’t come to this cafe…. But Yi-ho tried to arm himself with the brazenness he had learned from his partner. He wondered if this was how Min-gyu felt whenever he teased him. After confirming there were few people around, Yi-ho lowered his voice slightly.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were having a hard time?”
“Well, it’s a situation where there’s no immediate answer.”
“…….”
Since lunch hour was almost over, the two first stood up. Min-gyu quickly stuck close to Yi-ho’s side and examined his face.
“First you discipline Song-i, and now you’re scolding me? Are you upset because I didn’t tell you I was struggling and just smiled and pretended to be fine?”
This guy—he knew exactly how to pinpoint the emotions that Yi-ho himself hadn’t even fully sorted out. He made it so that Yi-ho’s anger had no choice but to melt away in the face of such honesty.
“It’s not just that, I just… felt a bit of empathy. I wondered if this is how you felt when I was working overtime and rolling around in pain.”
“Oho.”
Min-gyu’s eyebrows shot up instantly.
“Right, you tore my heart to shreds back then. My baby was clearly a fresh pine mushroom, but day by day, he was turning into a dried shiitake, wasn’t he? So I took extreme care of him, only for him to push me away with that scrawny body….”
“Ah, I shouldn’t have said anything….”
“But the fact that my partner is worrying is more upsetting than my own heart was back then, so I’ll make sure to sort out those shitty matters quickly.”
“…….”
Yi-ho felt as if his shoulders were melting away. For a while now, a feeling like a warm lump of water had been surging and swirling inside him.
Suddenly, he wondered if Min-gyu had been taking care of him first like this in countless other moments. Moments he had been too dull to notice.
Yi-ho had coveted Cha Min-gyu his entire life. The feeling he had lumped together as simply liking someone became clearer once they became partners. Since Min-gyu was a special existence to Yi-ho, he had hoped he was the same to the other man.
And in this moment, Yi-ho wished for Min-gyu to be very, very close. Including the good things and the worries. He hoped they would move toward a relationship where all of that was natural.
The line between the two had collapsed long ago. They moved freely through the shared space they had created.
Then, without looking back, Yi-ho strode forward.
It was a sudden greed for a new territory.
∗ ∗ ∗
Yi-ho bowed twice on the silver foil mat and stood up. His mother, who attended church, offered a short prayer and then walked around the burial mound, plucking out protruding weeds by hand.
“Goodness, if you’re going to go, you should go when it’s cool. Going when the mosquitoes are at their most venomous just makes your son’s skin get torn up.”
The scratching on the back of his hand was immediately caught. Yi-ho hid his already red, swollen hand in his pocket.
“I did spray mosquito repellent….”
And on his wrist was a mosquito repellent band with a Jelly Jelly Roll printed on it. This, too… hadn’t played a big role.
Yi-ho’s father was buried in the family mountain in Gangwon Province. Yi-ho leaned a bouquet of flowers, which he had set beside him, against the grave. There was no way a son who lacked a single grain of sense—just like his father—could have prepared it; Min-gyu had handed it to him this morning. The full-bloom flowers added color to the desolate mound. Even Song Yi-ho, a science-minded person who denied the existence of superstition, found himself speaking sincerely to the deceased in front of his father’s grave.
‘Dad, Cha Min-gyu gave me those. You know… what he and I are doing, right? Um, I liked him for a long time, and then we started dating.’
Just as he was pondering what else to say, the carefully leaned bouquet slid to the side and flopped over. Uh, ah, no.
‘Ah, no, why are you rejecting someone’s sincerity…!’
Yi-ho approached again and straightened the bouquet. As soon as Yi-ho let go, the bouquet tilted to the side again. Yi-ho felt as if he were sitting at a cold, stiff meeting between the two families.
‘Just accept it! I like Cha Min-gyu a lot, too.’
Yi-ho carefully stood the bouquet up once more. Behind the struggling son, his mother approached.
“Why does it keep falling over? Give it here.”
She then dug into the ground at the base of the mound with the tip of her foot. The stems of the bouquet were pushed deep into the small hole created under her foot.
“Yi-ho’s dad, Min-gyu bought those. You never had a chance to receive flowers from me or your son in your life, so take these quickly.”
It was probably… due to scientific principles, but the bouquet was now fixed upright.