By Zephyria 
Yoon Joo-ho didn’t answer. Instead, he grabbed Song Hyun-soo’s hand and pulled him into his arms. Resting his chin on Song Hyun-soo’s shoulder, Song Hyun-soo gazed at the warm sunlight on the distant lawn.
“Do you know what I was thinking while talking with my brother?”
“I’m not really curious.”You’re not curious about what I was thinking about you, senior?””
“……”I was thinking about how much I love you, senior.””
Yoon Joo-ho pulled Song Hyun-soo away from him and looked into his face. He looked as if he was hearing the words “I love you” for the first time from his lover.
“Even if you had met someone in the past, senior, it’s to the point where I can’t give up on you.” To the point where I don’t even care about that. That’s how much I love you.”
Yoon Joo-ho’s eyes shattered, trembled, and wavered.
“Me too.”
So did his voice.
“Everyone told me it was a complicated relationship and tried to stop me. But I couldn’t give you up, to the point where I didn’t care about any of that.”
Song Hyun-soo believed his sincerity. He was a man who, even if he turned people inside out with his honesty, couldn’t fabricate sweet, pleasant words. That’s why it was a story he brought up abruptly, like a small grumble about the past that had already passed. A story he could tell now because he was okay.
“And you cried in your sleep?”
Yoon Joo-ho’s eyebrows twitched.
“What are you talking about?”
Leading Yoon Joo-ho’s hand, Song Hyun-soo started walking again.
“The day we first brought Monroe home. Senior, you cried in your sleep. You said, ‘Don’t go,’ ‘It can’t be,’ ‘I’m sorry.’ You even shed tears, you know?”
He smiled bitterly. It was a thin, faint smile, as if he would disappear from sight at any moment.
Instead of heading straight to the lake, they turned onto another path. It was a deep promenade leading to a narrow stream extending from the lake.
“Do you remember?”
“Remember what?”
“When we hadn’t been dating for very long. I told you then. That you resembled someone I used to know.”
It was a memory he had completely forgotten, but the moment he heard those words, it vividly came back to him.
『”Looking at Song Hyun-soo today, he subtly resembles someone I used to know. I guess that’s what bothered me.”』
Was he saying he resembled his first love? Back then, he didn’t know anything and had mistakenly assumed that.
“Everyone likes animals when they’re young. I was the same.”You, senior?” I can’t imagine it.”
“It’s not like I was drinking, smoking, and living with my own sense of self-importance from the start.”
Song Hyun-soo burst out laughing in disbelief, and Yoon Joo-ho laughed along with Song Hyun-soo. But the laughter didn’t last long.
“My parents, who were adamant that I couldn’t have a dog or a cat, suddenly set a condition one day.”
“What condition?”
Feeling an ominous premonition, Song Hyun-soo couldn’t help but ask.
“If I won the Best Supporting Actor award at the year-end awards ceremony, they would let me bring a dog home.”
“Not the Best Child Actor award?”
“I had already received countless awards like that.”
What Yoon Joo-ho’s parents wanted was for him to be recorded as an actor who had won the Best Supporting Actor award despite not being an adult actor.
“But that was too high a hurdle. First of all, there weren’t many roles with that much importance for a child actor. Instead, I practically swept up awards everywhere that year with ‘Scorching Afternoon’.”
Scorching Afternoon.
Of course, Song Hyun-soo remembered the work.
The acting that Yoon Joo-ho, who was in the third or fourth grade of elementary school at the time, showed had stimulated the tear glands of the entire nation, including Song Hyun-soo’s grandmother, after his role as Crown Prince in his debut work.
“I took care of him with food and water, took him for walks whenever I had time, and even slept with him in my bed. He was a really good boy. He even succeeded in potty training shortly after coming home. He was a genius dog. Just like our Monroe.”
Yoon Joo-ho smiled as he reminisced about the dog. But Song Hyun-soo’s heart was already aching. Because he had a feeling that the ending of this story wouldn’t be a happy one.
“It’s probably the happiest memory of my entire childhood.”
Song Hyun-soo couldn’t rashly say anything.
“After bringing him home, my parents started using him as a hostage to threaten me. They would often scare me by saying they would give him away to another house.”
Cruel people.
People who deserved more than 20 years in prison.
Song Hyun-soo lowered his head and mechanically moved his legs, tightly holding onto Yoon Joo-ho’s hand.
“They said it was because of me. That they were sending him away because I acted irresponsibly.”
“……”
“No matter how much I begged, saying I would do everything they told me to, it was no use.”
“……”
“He was the only one who loved me unconditionally.”
He couldn’t bear it any longer.
When Song Hyun-soo looked up, they were standing on a small arched bridge. It was a hideout surrounded by large trees and a calm stream. The surroundings were all green.
Yoon Joo-ho stood there quietly. He didn’t cry, nor did his eyes well up with tears. That hurt Song Hyun-soo even more.
So that’s why he was so afraid of bringing Monroe home.
He didn’t want to have it because he was afraid of losing it, this person.
“I’ve never told this story to anyone. This is real.”
“I don’t care about that anymore.”
He hugged him. He didn’t care who saw, even if there were Koreans around. He didn’t care if paparazzi were taking pictures. If he couldn’t hug the person he loved in moments like this, there was no reason to live.
He rubbed his cheek against Yoon Joo-ho’s cheek.
“I’m going to love you even more.”
Hot tears seeped in between.
“As much as you didn’t receive from those people. I’m going to love you so much that you’ll be drowning in it, senior.”
Yoon Joo-ho’s arms embraced Song Hyun-soo in return.
“That’s enough for me.”
Only then did his voice tremble.
“I like the love you give me more.”
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