By Zephyria 
Song Hyun-soo, who had followed Yoon Joo-ho to the end of the hallway, slowly approached him. His hunched shoulders were rising and falling sharply.
“……”
As if sensing the approaching presence, he looked back over his shoulder. Then, he turned his body towards Song Hyun-soo.
Yoon Joo-ho, who had seemed confident, self-assured, and intensely angry with a hint of madness in front of his parents, now stumbled towards Song Hyun-soo like a beast who had exhausted all his energy. Seeing him like that, Song Hyun-soo couldn’t just stand by and also walked towards him with quicker steps.
They stopped a step apart, looking at each other.
He licked his lips as if embarrassed and said.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For showing you this side of me.”
“I hate it more when you hide this side and bear it alone.”
He gave a faint smile from beneath his lowered eyelids.
“You said it yourself. Don’t let them take it. I’m prepared to give up everything and fight.”
His lips quivered slightly as he took a small breath.
“Or…”
Yoon Joo-ho slowly raised his gaze, which had been directed towards the floor. Then, as if afraid of rejection, he very carefully toyed with Song Hyun-soo’s fingertips. His voice, cracked and hoarse, whispered.
“You don’t like Yoon Joo-ho when he’s not a top star, either?”
You, too.
The question itself hurt Song Hyun-soo, because he understood its meaning so well.
He shook his head firmly, afraid his voice would tremble if he spoke. He shook his head several times, wanting to convey his sincerity that it wasn’t so.
That he would love him unconditionally, even if he were a nobody actor like himself, or a jobless bum killing time at a PC bang. That he was different from his parents.
He was like someone who, pretending to be cold and indifferent, remained locked away at the top of a high castle, but was actually starving for people and affection, listening to the sounds of cheerful stories from the outside world.
Someone who was passionate about his work more than anyone, who knew how to be considerate and love, even if clumsily. It was for these reasons that Song Hyun-soo had ended up loving him, not just as an actor he admired.
He couldn’t help but feel a prickling sensation at the tip of his nose.
Song Hyun-soo clenched Yoon Joo-ho’s fingers, which were lightly touching his own, as if grasping them.
“Have you been living like that? Since you were that little kid?”
He couldn’t help but let his pent-up emotions show. His voice trembled unstably.
“Being treated like that by your own parents?”
“You’re worried about the guy who dumped you?”
“Who dumped whom? You were the one who said it was the end.”
Yoon Joo-ho smiled with a pale, weak face as Song Hyun-soo chided him with a face that looked like he was about to cry. Then, he opened his long, strong arms and pulled Song Hyun-soo into a full embrace. No, it wasn’t Yoon Joo-ho embracing Song Hyun-soo, but rather leaning into him as if falling. Song Hyun-soo had to step back a couple of paces to receive him.
Bowing his head deeply, he pressed his lips against Song Hyun-soo’s ear and smiled bitterly.
“Back then. I thought if I said that, you wouldn’t leave.”
“……”
“In my own way, I thought that was a way to make you stay.”
As he parted his lips to say something, Yoon Joo-ho stroked the back of his head and held him tighter.
“I know. I’m really messed up, aren’t I? It must be absurd.”
“Sunbae is a mess with potential for rehabilitation.”
“……”
“If you have the heart, you can learn language. But if you don’t have a heart, you can’t learn it, no matter what.”
Recalling Yoon Joo-ho’s parents, who seemed to lack hearts, he hugged his back. Then, he quietly closed his eyes.
“So, Sunbae will be okay.”
Yoon Joo-ho’s back, held in his embrace, heaved with a low chuckle.
“That’s a relief. Being a mess with potential for rehabilitation.”
His body swayed once more, as if collapsing heavily. Song Hyun-soo’s knees buckled, and he was pushed back until his back hit the hallway wall.
“Hyun-soo-ya.”
“……”
“Can I sleep for a bit, for now?”
Yoon Joo-ho slowly lifted his upper body from Song Hyun-soo’s shoulder. His face looked less sleepy and more like someone who had been drained of all life.
“I haven’t been sleeping well. But when I touch you, I feel so sleepy.”
“Yes, get some rest. My room is over there.”
Song Hyun-soo nodded and pointed to the innermost room at the end of the hallway.
“No, together.”
“……”
“Can’t I?”
Yoon Joo-ho’s eyes, filled with a pathetic light, pleaded for sympathy and mercy from Song Hyun-soo. His bloodshot eyes looked dry and sensitive, as if they might shatter at any moment.
“I’m not trying to sneak my way in. Just, consider it saving a life. Let me sleep for a bit.”
Song Hyun-soo exchanged a brief glance with Director Bang, who was standing within his line of sight. Confirming his nod, he grabbed Yoon Joo-ho’s wrist and led him towards his room.
As soon as they entered the room, he meticulously drew the blackout curtains. Turning around, Yoon Joo-ho stood awkwardly in the middle of the room, pacing. He was the kind of person who would shamelessly look for excuses to stay in Song Hyun-soo’s second-floor room, even when he was being brazen.
“You said you were sleepy. Lie down.”
“Okay.”
He rubbed the back of his neck and sat on the edge of the single bed. Then, he dragged his long legs, which looked heavy with fatigue, and lay down on his side.
“Ah.”
But as soon as he lay down, he scowled and sat up, rummaging through his pockets. What he pulled out were two bobby pins.
“I came out in the middle of getting my makeup done.”
Yoon Joo-ho let out a hollow laugh, looking down at the objects in his palm. As if he couldn’t believe he had done such a thing himself. He turned his body, placed the pins on the bedside table, and looked up at Song Hyun-soo, who was still standing by the window.
“You said you’d let me sleep. Aren’t you coming?”
“……”
“I won’t do anything strange. If I do, then truly, don’t forgive me.”
“I wasn’t thinking that.”
Song Hyun-soo replied curtly, rubbing his arm, and approached the bed.
“You haven’t recovered your boyfriend status yet. I won’t touch you.”
“……”
“If you want me to… I will.”
“Dream on.”
Smiling with a hint of playful teasing, Yoon Joo-ho silently watched Song Hyun-soo approach as he lay down. Occupying half of the narrow single bed, he stretched out one arm and pulled back the covers, making space for the spot next to him.
Swallowing dryly and moistening his lips with his tongue, Song Hyun-soo climbed onto the bed.
He lay on his side, his back to Yoon Joo-ho, not looking at him. His arm brushed against the space between his neck and the pillow, and as soon as he lay down, the soft blanket enveloped Song Hyun-soo’s entire body.
The person who said he wouldn’t touch because he hadn’t recovered his boyfriend status clung tightly to Song Hyun-soo’s back, just as he had during their time as boyfriends. An embrace that felt like complete restraint, using both arms and legs. Just like almost every night when he stayed at his house on the second floor.
His breath tickled the back of Song Hyun-soo’s neck and ear.
“It’s strange, isn’t it?”
“What is?”
“From now on, it might turn into a real dogfight, but when I’m like this, I feel at peace. I can sleep.”
“…Then sleep quickly. Stop talking.”
“Okay.”
His lips touched Song Hyun-soo’s exposed neck. He pressed down, kissing it, and then adjusted his position for comfort, holding Song Hyun-soo tightly as if binding him. But his lips, which had said he would sleep, moved again.
“You were cool earlier.”
“……”
Song Hyun-soo’s ears and neck turned red, feeling embarrassed in retrospect for his impulsive act of jumping into the fight. But he figured it wouldn’t be visible in the dark anyway.
“Don’t go anywhere while I’m sleeping.”
After saying that, he fell soundly asleep in less than a minute. His regular breathing tickled Song Hyun-soo’s neck and hair sweetly.
Yoon Joo-ho’s watch glinted faintly on his wrist, clasped across Song Hyun-soo’s chest. It was the watch Song Hyun-soo had retrieved from Cha Gyu-min. The watch Yoon Joo-ho had been wearing even at the moment he confessed his feelings.
He held his arm tightly.
He couldn’t believe what he had seen and heard himself just moments ago.
He had gradually come to understand as he grew up that having parents didn’t automatically mean happiness. But having parents, while perhaps not a condition for ‘happiness,’ was a condition for ‘normalcy.’ A self-evident basic premise.
Therefore, the absence of parents was an insurmountable weakness for Song Hyun-soo.
But parents like that. Parents like that…
Tears he had held back with all his might streamed onto the pillow. He stroked his arm, which he was holding tightly.
“It’s okay… don’t cry.”
Whether it was a sleepy utterance or a murmur from a half-awake moment, Yoon Joo-ho nuzzled his neck and soothed him. Then, he quieted down again.
When he wakes up, he would make kimchi pot rice.
Offering a warm meal to someone who had gone through such an ordeal. Feeding them. That was a matter of human decency, regardless of past mistakes. Even after severe scolding, his grandparents never took away the spoon. He swallowed his tears, caressed his arm, and Song Hyun-soo also drifted into sleep. It was a deep sleep after a long time.
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