By Zephyria 
He said he carved the scent of my body here….
Eun-myeong rubbed his palms repeatedly over the man’s tattoo. He also needlessly twisted and rubbed the shirt, which was heavily scented with perfume.
“But why suddenly Seoul?”
As he asked, why did his nose feel ticklish for no reason? It felt as if a gentle floral breeze was blowing from somewhere. His head spun from that strange, subtle wind.
It felt as if his brain were slowly melting…. Just as the man had etched Eun-myeong’s pheromones into a tattoo, it felt as if the man’s scent was engraved in Eun-myeong’s mind. And very deeply and thickly at that.
The man let out a smirk.
“Isn’t it time to put an end to this dog-like country life?”
Eun-myeong stared blankly at the man’s softening lips. No, was it not his head, but his chest…? Was the man’s scent engraved in his heart? His mind was in a flutter. His heart throbbed and trembled.
“Why do you want to take me with you?”
He was just a country bumpkin. All he knew how to do was greet customers at the sashimi restaurant, serve food in an apron, and cook a delicious spicy fish stew.
Everything in the world had its own use. Fish were for sashimi, pots were for boiling soup, and seasonings were for flavoring.
If Eun-myeong had a use, it was for things like working as a serving part-timer at a sashimi restaurant, not for nets. This place was perfect for him. This was where he belonged.
They said everything in Seoul was fast. People were so busy rushing around that they didn’t even have time to eat, and everyone was so smart that it was hard to find a job.
Eun-myeong didn’t know if he could keep up with those people. Until he learned how to work properly, he would just have to follow closely in the man’s wake. He would surely be a fool for a while.
“I won’t be of any help even if I go, so why do you want to take me along?”
…Do you perhaps love me even a little? Or do you show any signs of it? Do you miss me even a little when we’re apart? Or is it that….
Eun-myeong had a bundle of things he wanted to ask. Perhaps, as the man said, he just wanted to live his life talking about love. He felt like a fool whose mind had been wiped completely blank.
…Still, even so.
If the man told him here that he had even a shred of feeling for him, Eun-myeong wanted to lean on that tiny speck. He knew it was truly shameless, but he was about to say he would follow the man.
“If a man you love tells you to go, you should go.”
But that was how the man responded. Once again, the answer was left as Eun-myeong’s burden. Despite having carved a tattoo of him in black on his own body, despite coming all the way to the sashimi restaurant just to see him, and despite telling him to go to Seoul together. The heartless man would not tell him that he loved him.
At that, Eun-myeong carefully parted his lips.
“I was originally planning to go back to Noona.”
At those words, the man’s features began to distort. His eyes slanted sharply, and the corners of his mouth twisted menacingly. His jaw bulged firmly, as if he were grinding his molars.
“Leaving me behind?”
The man’s voice echoed eerily in the damp alley. The sticky resonance pierced through Eun-myeong’s highly sensitized ears.
“You think you can do that, leaving me behind?”
At the question of whether he dared to do such a thing, Eun-myeong’s eyebrows drooped. Arrogant, presumptuous… in short, he was truly obnoxious.
Just one word would have been enough. Noona had told him to come back, and he had replied that he would, and although he now knew how bad of a person the man was….
Still, if the man said he wanted him, he would have followed him without hesitation. Because Eun-myeong wanted to be by his side whether it snowed or the wind blew.
“Please let go…. I have to go back.”
This situation was too overwhelming. It felt as if he had become a mouse cornered in a nook. Eun-myeong squirmed, saying he would return to the shop. However, it was not enough to escape the man’s embrace. The man tightened his thick forearms and pulled him in sharply.
“Even if it’s to be in another bastard’s arms?”
The man spoke with a cruelty that was almost heartless to Eun-myeong, who was barely holding back tears with his upper lip pouting.
How could he say such a thing? Eun-myeong’s chest didn’t just ache; it felt as if it were being torn apart. Noticing how weakly his heart was wavering, the man pressed him relentlessly.
“Whether it’s your Boss’s lover, Park Woong, or some beggar rolling around the street, whoever it is, I’ll fuck them from behind.”
Then, he squeezed Eun-myeong’s buttocks hard, crushing them painfully.
“You see, I can’t sleep at all unless I have these plump cheeks in my hand.”
Liar. The man was lying. He was so sensitive to noise that he would wake up immediately at the sound of the wind. He only fell back asleep after confirming that Eun-myeong was by his side.
Despite being such a sensitive and ill-tempered person….
“Do you think you have a choice?”
He spoke, his thick eyebrows twitching exaggeratedly. A thick layer of mockery pooled at the corners of his twisted mouth.
Coward, truly mean. The man didn’t reveal a single one of his own emotions, yet he relentlessly tormented Eun-myeong. If he had just said once that he came to the shop because he missed him, Eun-myeong would have been incredibly happy.
Eun-myeong bit his lip hard. He was deeply disappointed in the man. The man’s eyes seemed to keep speaking of love, yet his mouth continued to hold a blade.
“You don’t need to think at all. Just say, ‘Yes, I understand,’ ‘Please pity me and adore me,’ ‘Please love me.’ That’s all you have to do.”
How was that any different from a well-behaved puppy? A surge of indignation rose within Eun-myeong, but he truly couldn’t let those words out. If the man were to tickle his chin and coax him with a “there, there,” Eun-myeong felt he would truly crumble.
“You have to behave prettily for me to feel like buying you something delicious. So your butt can get plump with fat.”
He took a wallet out of his back pocket and shoved a card into the pocket of Eun-myeong’s apron. As he did, he patted his buttocks. His broad shoulders turned.
The man was leaving him. Eun-myeong gazed defenselessly at that cold back. While he couldn’t leave the man, the man left the alley without looking back once.
For him, that was possible.
“…….”
The spring breeze blew softly. Eun-myeong’s apron fluttered. While a warm breeze blew like this, a violent storm raged in Eun-myeong’s heart.
Eventually, the man left the shop. Eun-myeong stood there blankly, staring at the already empty street.
Just then, a strong scent of pheromones wafted from behind.
“Is he gone?”
A high voice reached his ears from behind. Eun-myeong whipped around. His red apron fluttered. Before he knew it, the female Boss was leaning against the doorframe. She blew on her long nails, hoo, hoo.
“Kang Pyeong-won isn’t the type to use one thing for a long time.”
She had been in her small room applying cucumber masks before the man arrived, and she had come out the moment he left, as if by magic. As if she had intentionally avoided the spot to avoid crossing paths. It wasn’t that she feared the man, but rather a type of avoidance—like avoiding feces because it’s dirty, not because one is afraid.
“But I heard he redid the interior of his house in Hannam-dong.”
Why was she suddenly bringing this up in front of him? Eun-myeong just listened blankly, not understanding the meaning. He needlessly rubbed his lower abdomen with his palm. The area that had touched the man’s thick thighs felt hot, as if burned.
“I heard he told them to decorate everything in white, like a honeymoon suite. I wondered if he’d caught some late-blooming whim.”
The Boss walked toward him with a click-clack and thrust her face close to Eun-myeong’s.
“…Was he planning to hide you there?”
Then, she sniffed with her sharp, arrowhead-like nose and frowned deeply.
“Hide you where no one can see, then sneak in alone to look at you and fuck you deliciously?”
She clamped one hand over her nose. Was a bad smell leaking from him again? Eun-myeong hunched his shoulders. His slender neck retracted, folding like a turtle.
“Disgusting bastard. Just like his father’s bloodline, he’s completely coated him in his pheromones.”
The woman scanned Eun-myeong’s body from top to bottom with an expression of utter loathing. To be precise, it was an expression of hating the pheromones smeared all over his body more than death itself.
“I hate that bastard’s smell. Since long ago, it’s given me goosebumps on my scalp and made me shudder.”
As if to show him, the woman thrust her forearm toward Eun-myeong. Goosebumps were indeed blooming all over her skin.
“Well, for you, living as that bastard’s mistress would be an easier life than wasting your youth in a country hole like this.”
“Mistress….”
Eun-myeong chewed over the word quietly. That must be how he appeared in other people’s eyes.
“Why? You don’t like the word mistress?”
Beyond his weakly lowered eyelids, the woman’s red shoes drew closer.
“That bastard is Kang Pyeong-won; naturally, he’ll find a family that fits his status and get married.”
Eun-myeong was already struggling enough to handle the emotions he possessed. But the man’s marriage. It felt like a total system overload. Eun-myeong gripped the card tightly in his hand. Using the excuse of paying, he tried to move his feet as if fleeing.
“I’ll go… I’ll pay.”
The voice from behind caught Eun-myeong’s ankle.
“Hey.”
Eun-myeong carefully turned around. His face was indescribably gloomy.
“Do you still not get it?”
“Get what…?”
Eun-myeong looked up with vacant eyes. For a moment, the woman wondered if he was acting like a fox despite knowing. However, the innocent gaze looked at her as if to say, I really don’t know anything.
Tsk, she clicked her tongue inwardly. No wonder that Gumiho bastard, Kang Pyeong-won, snapped him up. With a face as white as milk and a gentle personality, even she felt her mouth watering.
If he had caught her eye first, she would have snapped him up for a bite too. Of course, now that Kang Pyeong-won’s scent was pouring out of his entire body, any appetite she had was instantly gone.
“Kang Pyeong-won bought this place.”
This fishy-smelling shop, I mean, the woman added. Eun-myeong stared blankly.
“Go and ask him to buy you something expensive with that. If you smile with your eyes like a little fox and sway your hips, he’ll probably buy you land and give you a house.”
Like a fool, the Boss put a cigarette in her mouth.
“Men who’ve lost their minds over the scent of skin all end up that way.”