SMW 23

The moment my eyes met Choi Seol’s, I threw the receiver in my hand and dove into a corner to hide. Even though I was right next to the bathroom door Choi Seol had entered, this wall effectively blocked the line of sight. Only after hiding where I could no longer feel Choi Seol’s gaze did I clutch my head and slump to the floor. The sound of running water continued.

What is this? What? What on earth is this!

I couldn’t bring myself to say it out loud, so I writhed in silent desperation, when suddenly, the image of Choi Seol’s shower scene flashed through my mind.

Aaaagh!

This time, a scream almost burst out for real, so I quickly covered my mouth. My face felt hot against my palm. I didn’t even need to look in a mirror to know how red I must be.

Surely he doesn’t think I was peeping on purpose. That would be truly unfair. Seeing how flustered he looked, it seemed he hadn’t known the wall was like that either.

Just how spaced out did he have to be to not notice that? No, the bigger problem was me, for not averting my eyes the instant I discovered it. I covered my face completely with both hands.

I had no idea how to look him in the eye once he came out. Either way, it looked like I’d blatantly Read on Read BL Novelspeeked, [unauthorized copy]so I felt like I should apologize, but I definitely needed to include an excuse…

But why is it so quiet?

At some point, the sound of water stopped. Is he coming out now? I bolted upright. Simultaneously, a sudden chill against my skin gave me goosebumps. Only then did I remember that I was wearing nothing but a pair of underwear. The thought that Choi Seol must have seen me like this made my head spin. At this rate, I’d have no right to complain even if I were treated like a total pervert.

I rushed toward the wardrobe to put on a robe. However, it had been set up so meticulously that the tie to close the front was knotted, making it impossible to put on quickly. Unknotting it wasn’t hard, but because I was in such a rush, my hands kept slipping.

Just then, the doorbell rang through the room. Before I could even panic, I heard the bathroom door open behind me.

Unlike me, Choi Seol, who had properly donned his robe in the meantime, looked over at me. In that instant, my shame gauge didn’t just fill up—it exploded. I ended up fleeing back toward the bedroom. I dove between the bed and the glass bathroom wall, which no longer reflected anyone, and buried my face in my knees. Choi Seol didn’t follow. Instead, the doorbell rang a couple more times before stopping, and I heard the door open.

“I’m here for the laundry you wanted to send out.”

“Could you please wait outside for a moment?”

Hearing Choi Seol’s usual calm voice, I heard the employee respond that they would. The door closed again, and I strained my hearing to catch every single sound, including the scuffing of slippers. Contrary to my wish for him to move away, the sound grew closer. I hunched my stiff shoulders and hugged my knees tighter. Soon, the sound of slippers stopped right beside me. The gaze looking down at me, the heavy silence, and the deep scent emanating from someone who had just showered.

When those undeniable sensations swept [visit our site]over [Read on Read BL Novels]my entire body and finally reached stolen contentmy heart, something was draped over my shoulders.

“Go in and wash up now. I’ll take care of the laundry.”

I slowly lifted my head at the sound of his voice, which had sunk into a softer tone than when he spoke to the employee. Choi Seol was looking down at me indifferently. That expressionless look eased my tension just a little.

“I wasn’t peeping.”

“I know. I didn’t know it was like that either.”

“Crazy, how could you not know that? You were standing right there.”

“Sorry. My mind was elsewhere.”

He wore a bitter expression as he said this, making it impossible for me to press him further. Since I couldn’t really blame him for anything, I stayed quiet, and Choi Seol spoke again as if to soothe me.

“Stay in the bathroom. It looks like they brought an extra duvet, so I think I need to put it back inside.”

“Huh? Oh, okay.”

I scrambled to my feet. The thing draped over my shoulders slipped down to my feet; I picked it up and saw it was a robe. He must have brought it for me on purpose. Only then did I remember my state and quickly picked it up to cover my front.

“I’m not a pervert.”

“I told you I know.”

As I desperately made excuses, Choi Seol seemed to find it amusing, as the corners of his mouth curled up. The atmosphere had become considerably lighter. I didn’t know if it was because he’d showered or if my appearance was truly that funny, but he finally seemed to have returned to the version of Choi Seol I’d seen over the past few days.

“…I’m going in.”

Choi Seol said nothing more and stepped aside for me. Covering myself, I hurried into the bathroom. The moment I closed the door and looked in the mirror, I realized one major fact. I should have covered my back as well as my front.

“I must have looked like a total pervert.”

Thinking of Choi Seol seeing that, I wouldn’t have any excuse even if I died of shame right now. I wanted to scream if I could, but I held my breath at the sound of the door opening again in the hallway. It sounded like the employee had entered and was talking to Choi Seol, but I couldn’t hear well because of the sound of water.

Water? Choi Seol should have turned it unauthorized copyoff when he left, so it was strange. I peeked toward the Read on Read BL Novelsbathtub to find the source of the sound, and saw that it was being filled.

Come to think of it, he’d used the excuse that he was going to soak in the tub earlier. To think he’d take care of something like this personally while claiming to be spaced out—it was moving beyond touching and becoming almost scary. This was why I kept doubting him.

I glared at the water filling the tub as if it were some hazardous material, then cautiously dipped my hand in. It was the perfect temperature to relieve fatigue. Suddenly, I felt that the bathroom was cold.

Wanting to get in and soak quickly, I hung the robe on the wall and was about to pull down my underwear when I remembered again that the bathroom wall was made of glass. However, when I snapped my head up, I saw nothing beyond the tub.

The blinds closed from the outside were effectively blocking the view. Choi Seol must have done this too. Relieved, I stripped off my underwear and quickly climbed into the tub. The warmth of the water, far more comforting than when I’d only dipped my hand, enveloped my entire body. As I leaned my back against the tub and stretched out, a long sigh escaped me, feeling as if I could finally breathe. It felt as though all the tension I’d held was unraveling at once. Even so, my gaze drifted toward the glass wall.

I couldn’t help but be bothered by it. A structure where the blinds could be opened and closed at will from the outside, not the inside. It wasn’t just strange; it was incomprehensible. Still, since Choi Seol would never secretly peek in here, it wasn’t something I needed to be particularly sensitive about. The fact that it bothered me was entirely my own problem.

Don’t throw me away.

Starting with those words, I had fallen into a state of suspicion. It might have been an overreaction, but the intuition born from my experience was sending me signals.

Why on earth would he say something like that to me? Perhaps he was overlapping me with someone else. Had he really been abandoned by someone? But Choi Seol wasn’t an orphan.

That’s why the term ‘biological father,’ which had been mentioned for the first time today, came to mind. Since Choi Seol never spoke [Read on Read BL Novels]of his family other than his mother and grandmother, it was unauthorized copya presence I’d never given much thought to. Even when I wanted to ask, I’d let it go, assuming visit our sitethere were circumstances, but he was alive and had actually been involved in Choi Seol’s life since his first year of high school. And he didn’t seem like an ordinary person.

A memory from the past suddenly surfaced. I had once met a man who introduced himself as a representative of Choi Seol’s father. Perhaps he was the lawyer the landlord mentioned earlier. Then, was the ‘abandonment’ indeed from his father? But the emotion Choi Seol showed at the mention of his biological father was closer to rage. Conversely, the look in his eyes when he pleaded not to be thrown away was so poignant and desperate that it felt like looking at a human being who had been brutally abandoned.

That impression was so intense that I almost wavered. To the point of delusion.

“He’s not actually into me, is he?”

The words I absentmindedly spoke echoed in the bathroom. I covered my mouth with my hand and held my breath. The sound of the water Choi Seol had turned on filled the space. I felt a genuine sense of relief that there was noise other than my own voice. However, awareness quickly returned.

What on earth am I doing?

Looking down at the hand that had covered my mouth, a hollow laugh escaped me. The body’s reaction, which I uttered cautiously even when alone, dragged up a useless corner of memory.

It had been a long time since I’d done this. There was a time when just being in the same space made it impossible to breathe, and all my nerves were so focused on that person that I couldn’t keep my head straight. After being pushed and pushed, I had discovered an irreversible emotion through a gap that had crumbled hollowly at a single touch of warm body heat. When I recalled how arduous a flower garden I had walked through since then, I snapped back to my senses.

The one who liked them was me. Not Choi Seol.

I scooped up handfuls of water and splashed them on my face repeatedly. Perhaps because the warm water kept flowing, the temperature had risen slightly from before. Thanks to that, I only ended up heating myself up more. A feeling of suffocation rose. I eventually pushed myself [unauthorized copy]up from the tub. The water, which unauthorized copyhad been filled to the brim, overflowed simultaneously. Even though the waves surged and flowed out of the tub several times, the water level continued to rise because of the faucet that kept vomiting water.

It felt like a warning. That if I didn’t shut it off quickly, it would eventually overflow again.

Instead of shutting off the faucet, I drained the tub and switched to shower mode. The warm water, set by Choi Seol, poured over my head. Without hesitation, I turned it to cold.

When I finished showering and stepped out, Choi Seol was sitting at the table by the window. Not knowing I had come out yet, his gaze remained fixed on the view outside.

“Thanks for drawing the bath.”

Only when I approached the table and spoke did Choi Seol look back at me.

“You came out quickly.”

“I felt a bit stifled.”

As I pulled out the opposite chair and sat down, Choi Seol pushed one of the two bottles of water in front of him toward me. I happened to be thirsty.

“They said they’d bring the clothes tomorrow morning.”

Just as I grabbed the cap of the water bottle, Choi Seol spoke as if reporting. Come to think of it, I had ducked into the bathroom as if handing over the task, without properly organizing the clothes to be collected.

“Sorry. It was a bit of a mess, wasn’t it?”

“You had almost everything ready, so it was simple. They took all the shoes too.”

“Thank goodness. I didn’t think they’d take the shoes.”

“It is a hotel, after all. The service seems to be on the better side. But…”

Choi Seol broke off and looked at me for a moment.