By Zephyria “Why are you following me? We have to keep a proper watch on that guy and my sister.”
Lee San pushes Baek Kang’s chest as he follows. But Baek Kang pulls his hand down and laughs emptily.
“Why would I watch Sol?”
“Sigh, that’s why you’re no good, hyung.”
Lee San, responding curtly with a sigh, taps the ground with the toe of his sneaker and starts walking ahead.
“Whether he’s a film director or whatever, I don’t like that guy.”
“Why, he’s got good manners, he’s sophisticated… seems like a well-educated person.”
Following a few steps behind, Baek Kang replies in a leisurely tone.
“Well-educated, my ass. All he does is speak with a lisp, he sounds like a con artist. Isn’t his story about living in America all a lie?”
Lee San turns around, his temper flaring.
Baek Kang catches up to Lee San and stands beside him, placing a hand on the crown of Lee San’s head, who is wearing a hood.
“You can find out just by searching the internet. He’s made a lot of good films.”
Despite his gentle voice, Lee San’s hostility doesn’t subside. Lee San brushes away Baek Kang’s hand, which is treating him like a child.
“If he’s so great, why is he holed up in a backwater like this? Isn’t that suspicious in itself?”
“He says he’s planning his next project.”
Lee San starts walking ahead again. Baek Kang knows him well enough to guess his expression just by his gait. Baek Kang smiles faintly and slowly follows Lee San.
“Right. But why does it have to be here? How many seaside towns are there in the world? He could go somewhere more famous, more beautiful. He’s rich, isn’t he?”
“Is there anywhere more beautiful than Myung Hae-ri?”
“Ah, well…!”
Lee San, who had stopped walking and turned around to shout, closes his lips tightly with a frustrated expression. Lee San cannot admit, cannot even imagine, that there is a place more beautiful than Myung Hae-ri.
Lee Sol had even attended college outside their hometown, if only for one semester. And although it was due to an unfortunate incident, Baek Kang had to spend eight years away from Myung Hae-ri.
But for Lee San, Myung Hae-ri was everything.
Baek Kang and Lee Sol were like the entire world to him.
“My sister doesn’t like him either.”
“Why are you bringing up Sol, who’s just minding her own business?”
Baek Kang walks a few more steps and stops beside Lee San. He gently pokes Lee San’s cheek, who has a sulky expression just like when he was young, and laughs as if he’s cute.
“My sister indulges that guy’s boasting too much.”
The smile on Baek Kang’s face gradually turns bitter. He then looks down at an angle and starts walking ahead of Lee San this time.
“It’s Sol’s area of interest. He likes books and movies, but you and I… don’t know much about that, so she probably needs someone to talk to.”
Instead of following Baek Kang, Lee San stares intently at his back. He clenches his fists tightly without realizing it.
“Are you serious, hyung?”
“Why wouldn’t I be serious?”
“You don’t care if my sister is taken away?”
“…”
Baek Kang’s steps slow down and then stop completely. He stands there, head bowed, without looking back. He shoves one hand into his jumper pocket and uses the other to rub the back of his neck.
Baek Kang’s silence is heavy.
“My sister was unreachable all day yesterday, wasn’t she?”
“…”
“Do you know what I saw?”
“Lee San, let’s stop.”
Baek Kang’s voice, which had been gentle all along, turns cold. But Lee San doesn’t care.
“While you were gone, I… wanted to freeze time. So that nothing would change. So that when you returned, the three of us could live exactly as we did before. But it’s not possible. Time keeps flowing, and everything changes.”
Baek Kang returns to Lee San’s side, who is rambling as if terrified. Lee San grabs Baek Kang’s waist as he stops in front of him and looks up at him.
“You’re not, are you? You’re still the same, right?”
“Sani.”
Lee San, who had been abused by his biological father for a long time along with Lee Sol, is pathologically afraid of the bond between the three of them breaking. Even when he witnessed Baek Kang killing his biological father, what scared Lee San the most was the possibility of Baek Kang going to prison.
To calm the agitated Lee San, Baek Kang first tries to hug him. But Lee San is adamant. He tightly grips Baek Kang’s arms as he tries to embrace him and stares straight up at him with eyes glinting with madness.
“Marry her.”
“…What?”
“Marry my sister right now.”
His gaze, which firmly believes that this is the only solution, turns to Baek Kang.
“Hey, what are you talking about? It’s not that easy…”
“You were going to do it anyway! You promised me when I was three years old!”
Lee San, shouting with a voice tinged with tears, then looks around the surroundings and mutters to himself.
“You should have gotten married before you left! Yes, that’s right, you should have done that. Then my sister wouldn’t have become a traitor!”
“Lee San, shut up.”
Baek Kang’s gloved hands cup and lift Lee San’s cheeks. The force is enough to press his cheeks. These were lines and actions not in the script.
Yet, at that moment, the man before him felt more like Baek Kang than ever before.
In this desolate winter field, in Myung Hae-ri where everyone had left, in the entire universe, it felt like only the two of them remained. As Baek Kang and Lee San.
Without the director, the cameras, or any staff, just the two of them.
The leather gloves, which felt like ice the moment they touched his cheeks, quickly warmed up, melting with body heat.
As the usually gentle Baek Kang threatened him with harsh words and actions, tears immediately welled up in Lee San’s eyes. Song Hyun-soo didn’t even need to act to produce tears. He was genuinely hurt to death.
Lee San, who had been holding Baek Kang’s waist, clenched his fists tightly to hold back his tears. The force was so strong that his finger joints ached, and his fingernails dug into his palms. But Song Hyun-soo didn’t even feel it.
He looked up at Baek Kang with eyes so straight they didn’t doubt his own belief even slightly. As he blinked, a single tear traced a long line down to his chin. Lee San muttered to himself in a very small voice.
“If you’re not my sister’s husband… then you have nothing to do with me.”
“…”
“I can never forgive you.”
Baek Kang’s eyes, facing him, wavered greatly.
Whether it was an actor’s reaction to Lee San’s lines filled with obsession, or because Song Hyun-soo had changed Lee San’s lines, it was unclear. But it was clear that he, too, was completely immersed in this moment.
It felt as if their senses were connected.
The sound of waves, heard from afar, swept over Song Hyun-soo’s body, sending shivers down his spine before receding.
Originally, Song Hyun-soo’s last line in that scene should have been: “If my sister is taken, I won’t forgive you either.”
But as he practiced with Yoon Joo-ho, the emotions built up within Song Hyun-soo and flowed somewhere. It was a natural line that came from where it flowed.
He felt certain. Lee San would have definitely said it this way.
In the darkness, listening to the sound of the waves, they continued to look into each other’s eyes.
Baek Kang, Yoon Joo-ho, his dry lips moved as if to say something.
A poignant longing, wanting to approach but hesitating at the same time. He looked down at Lee San with empty eyes, like someone who had lost everything.
Like a fish in water, he kept opening and closing his mouth, but each time, he couldn’t say anything. He simply, silently, cupped Lee San’s head and slowly pulled him into his embrace.
Lee San rested his chin on Baek Kang’s shoulder.
It was a shoulder that felt like it could protect everything. For Lee San.
Baek Kang’s complex emotions, felt through their contact, reached him. Baek Kang, too, must have known that Lee Sol’s feelings had changed, were changing.
As he closed his eyes, tears he hadn’t realized were still there flowed down heavily once more.
The scene was over. Yoon Joo-ho slowly pulled away from Song Hyun-soo.
Without realizing it, their fingertips had become intertwined. Yoon Joo-ho’s face was flushed. He rubbed his mouth with his hand and started walking towards the beach without a word. Song Hyun-soo’s wish to walk holding hands had been fulfilled.
His steps gradually quickened, and the grip on Song Hyun-soo’s hand grew stronger. By the time the car in the open lot came into view, they were almost running, as if by mutual agreement.
All they could think about was wanting to pour this current excitement onto each other.
Yoon Joo-ho opened the rear door and practically pushed Song Hyun-soo inside.
Thump. As Song Hyun-soo got into the car, the sound of the door closing behind him was heard before he could even turn around, and Yoon Joo-ho roughly grabbed his shoulder and pulled him. Their faces met, and Yoon Joo-ho looked almost angry.
“Mph. Mmm, mm…”
Yoon Joo-ho, his lips pressed against his, unzipped his jumper and quickly took it off. One of his gloves fell off and rolled away.
Song Hyun-soo also untied the string and pulled down his hood. Yoon Joo-ho, throwing his jumper somewhere in the front seat, unzipped Song Hyun-soo’s jacket and reached his hand inside to pull the jumper off his shoulders. Their movements were so synchronized, as if they had done this dozens of times in this very spot.
All the while, they didn’t break their kiss. They turned their heads this way and that, attacking each other as if in a fight.
“Mmm. Hhup, hup. Haa.”
Unable to withstand Yoon Joo-ho’s weight, who pressed himself close as if to push him into the seat, Song Hyun-soo’s upper body tilted back. His head hit the rear window. Yoon Joo-ho was sprawled between his legs.
Cornering Song Hyun-soo so he couldn’t move, Yoon Joo-ho finally slowly pulled away his lips. Making eye contact with Song Hyun-soo, who was gasping for breath, he bit the tip of his middle finger on his glove and pulled it off.