SMW 99

Ah, this is making me look truly pathetic. I tried to rub my eyes while leaning stubbornly against the wall, but Choi Seol grabbed my arm and pulled me toward him. Despite my struggling to push him away, I ended up in his arms. His embrace was unfairly wide and warm.

“……Il-sun-i isn’t coming to eat.”

Tearfully, I poured out the things I had wanted to say most.

“And I heard a kid who looked like Il-sun-i was hit by a car and died recently. I tried to check the body, but they said the old man downstairs already burned it……. And you were gone, and I couldn’t get a hold of you, and I really didn’t know what to do…….”

Even during those dawn hours when I hated waking up, I would go out and sit in front of the cat’s food bowl for a long time. I waited until the sun rose even after all the neighborhood cats had visited, and just in case, I took walks through alleys I had never gone down before. Every time I did, people would ask about Choi Seol’s whereabouts, which only ended up ruining my mood, leaving me shut inside my house clutching my phone.

Time passed like that, but nothing grew dull or was forgotten.

“You’re a real piece of shit.”

“I am. I really am a piece of shit.”

Choi Seol whispered, hugging me even tighter. That made me choke up again, and I sobbed.

“Weren’t you worried about me? I was worried to the point that I could’ve died.”

“……Were you?”

“Yes. How could you do this to me?”

“I know. I’m a total bastard.”

“That’s why I told you. I’m going to kill you.”

“Fine. If it’s by your hand, I’ll gladly die.”

I don’t even know what he’s talking about.

In a way, his responses were nothing more than incredibly light, but I wasn’t angry anymore. Part of it was the gentle way he patted my back, but it was also the emotions leaking through his tight voice between those light answers that shook my heart.

I could feel so strongly that he had missed me terribly too, and in the end, I couldn’t push him away or escape his embrace.

There were still many things to say and hear, but in this moment, I just wanted to pour out all the sorrow and hardship I’d felt during our time apart. I still looked pathetic, but I was glad.

I was truly glad that you still missed me, and that I didn’t have to miss you anymore.

And so, held in Choi Seol’s tenderness for the unauthorized copy[visit our site]first [visit our site]time in a long while, I cried for a long time.

When I opened my eyes, the rain had stopped. I couldn’t tell what time it was because the sky, glimpsed through the window, was still overcast. It certainly wasn’t night, so was it morning? I wanted to check outside more clearly, but it wasn’t easy to fully open my eyes. I wondered if it was because they were dry, but my eyelids themselves felt incredibly heavy. As I reflexively swallowed, my throat stung.

Well, after crying like that last night, there’s no way I’d be in top shape.

I don’t know what made me so sorrowful, but I had wailed in Choi Seol’s arms. And then I had no memory. I must have fallen asleep from exhaustion.

Feeling the touch of the plush sheets against my back, I pushed myself up. I felt like staying lying down would only result in a headache. I sat up at the head of the bed, barely opening my swollen eyes to slowly look around. Choi Seol was nowhere to be seen, having gone out somewhere. Because of that, a momentary, terrifying delusion crossed my mind—that this might be a dream. That I wanted to see Choi Seol so badly that I was dreaming of our reunion.

Honestly, kissing the moment we met on a rainy day was too unrealistic.

Thinking that far made me feel truly scared, but I was able to remain calm because the space I was in was so unfamiliar.

Unlike my maternal home, which was simple, old, and smelled of wood, the room I was in now blended the quiet elegance of a hanok with modern interior design, reminiscent of a luxury hotel. While I felt pampered, being in this space that lacked any human touch gave me a strong sense that this wasn’t a dream, which ironically put me at ease.

Still, I hope he comes back soon. He wouldn’t have just left me behind and gone somewhere else, would he? It was still difficult to completely shake off the anxiety.

Just as I was becoming anxious again, I heard the sound of the door opening.

“Are you awake?”

“…….”

Looking toward the sound, Choi Seol was standing at the door. In that instant, my anxiety vanished as if it had been a lie. He was dressed in a suit, just like yesterday.

I hadn’t noticed yesterday because I was out of it, but seeing him now, he looked a bit thinner. Thanks to that, his features were more defined, giving him a firmer and sharper look. Combined with the navy striped suit and his hair neatly slicked back, he exuded a deep sense of maturity, unlike when I saw him in the countryside.

Perhaps that was why my heart fluttered strangely for the first time in a long while. Though it wasn’t the time for such things.

“I stepped out for a moment to take a work call. I thought it would be too noisy if I did it next to you.”

Choi Seol approached the bed and leaned down. He reached out, gently brushing my bangs aside as he asked.

“How are you feeling?”

“Huh?”

The voice that burst out was severely cracked. When I closed my mouth in surprise, Choi Seol’s expression stiffened slightly.

“Let’s drink some water first.”

He poured water from a pitcher on the bedside table into a glass and handed it to me. As I took a sip, my throat stung. I handed the glass back to Choi Seol.

“Drink more.”

“Later. My throat stings and I’m too tired.”

No matter how much I had cried, I had no strength in my body. It felt as if all my fatigue had suddenly rushed in, leaving my body limp. Then, I heard him mutter beside me, sounding troubled.

“I told you to drink plenty of water.”

“What?”

Instead of answering, Choi Seol, holding the water glass, pushed his way in next to me. As I stared blankly at the situation, which was identical to yesterday, he brought the glass to his own lips. Was he thirsty too?

Just as I was starting to feel embarrassed that he so casually drank from the glass I had been using, Choi Seol tilted his head toward me. I instinctively leaned my upper body back, but he gripped the back of my head to keep me from escaping and pressed his lips against mine. What entered my unexpectedly parted lips was none other than water.

He wasn’t drinking the water, he was holding it in his mouth?

While I was in shock, the water filling my mouth gradually flowed down my throat. After I was forced to swallow a few mouthfuls, his lips finally parted. At the same time, I burst into a cough.

“Cough! What the hell… was that.”

“I told you that you need to drink plenty of water.”

“Who the hell told you that?”

“The doctor.”

“What? Wa—wait……. Mmph!”

Before I knew it, Choi Seol, having taken another mouthful of water, pressed his lips against mine again. Water entered my mouth once more, and I had to diligently swallow despite the stinging pain in my throat. But this time, his lips didn’t pull away easily.

His tongue, which had entered unnoticed, began to act willfully, touching the inside. The arm wrapped around my waist moved to keep me from shifting, and his hand kept fumbling over my clothes. My body jolted from the stimulation continuing above and below. A ticklish heat started from my toes and gradually raised my body temperature.

My head, still not fully awake, was growing hazy. At this rate, something serious might actually happen. Honestly, it wasn’t that I hated it, but now was not the time. Desperately clutching onto the string of my rationality, I pushed Choi Seol’s chest with all my might.

“Calm down. Why the hell are you so worked up since early morning?”

“…….”

At the protest I snapped the moment our lips parted, Choi Seol’s eyebrows twitched. But that was the only reaction. I found myself speechless under his gaze, which stared at me without any excuse. It was a look that was always poignant and hot. The only difference from before was that the longing I could only occasionally feel within it had deepened. That thick intensity that had once made me instinctively step back.

I was flustered, not knowing how to react. Choi Seol brushed his hair back and let out a deep sigh.

“It’s not morning.”

“……Huh?”

Not morning?

“It’s afternoon. Lunchtime passed a long while ago.”

At Choi Seol’s unexpectedly calm explanation, I looked out the window. I clearly thought it was overcast earlier, but the sky visible through the gaps in the clouds was blue. As he said, it was definitely daytime.

“You had a raging fever all night. That’s why a doctor came and went.”

As I looked back at him, Choi Seol added.

“They said it seems to be a stress-induced cold, but just in case, you should go to the hospital later…….”

“Wa—wait a second. I… was actually sick?”

“Yes.”

I had no idea. I touched my forehead. There was some heat left from being worked up a moment ago, but it wasn’t hot to the level of a sick person.

“I’m fine?”

“Let me see.”

Choi Seol moved my hand from my forehead and placed his own there instead.

“……The fever has definitely gone down.”

“I told you. I’m just a bit weak, but my body is fine.”

Setting aside the fact that my throat and eyes were swollen because I cried, the limpness I felt when I woke up now felt truly gone. Perhaps it was because I had been fed water twice in such a bizarre manner that I had snapped awake. Or maybe I had absorbed some of that bastard’s yang energy while kissing.

I swallowed the saliva pooling in my mouth and spoke again.

“Usually, your temperature rises temporarily when you cry. I’m fine, so I don’t need a hospital.”

“No. You should still go.”

I was flustered by Choi Seol’s unexpectedly firm response.

“Hey. I said I’m fine, so why are you being like this?”

“I heard you were discharged as soon as you woke up after the car accident. And you didn’t get a single check-up after that. You never know. Yesterday’s fever could be a sequela of the accident…….”

Choi Seol’s mouth, which had been chatting away, snapped shut under my blatant stare. He [Read on Read BL Novels]really had an [stolen content]uncanny ability to read the room.

“How did you even find out about that?”

He hadn’t contacted me once, yet he knew my situation inside out. I felt like if I asked how many times a day I fed the cats, the exact answer would come out of that mouth.

“Ah, so that’s why you didn’t contact me once. Because you knew where I was, what I was doing, and what state I was in.”

“It’s not like that…….”

“I haven’t heard any explanations yet, but I know one thing for sure. Twenty-seven-year-old Choi Seol had a wonderful streak of perversion. You stalking bastard.”

I threw the pillow in my hand at Choi Seol and climbed out of bed. He immediately followed.

“Han Yeo-reum, where are you going?”

“Why ask? You’ll find out anyway.”

“……First, calm down and listen to me.”

“I’m very rational right now. I’m in a state where I can judge that it’s dangerous to be in the same room as a criminal.”

“It’s a misunderstanding.”

Choi Seol grabbed me and turned me around.