By Zephyria 
Cha Jeong-won’s eyes narrowed. It was an expression that seemed to say he would watch to see what Haon was going to say.
“You thought I was just pretending it was a coincidence and clinging to you, didn’t you?”
So why did you come here?
Perhaps because of the alcohol, he felt a little braver.
Cha Jeong-won’s fingers, which had been tapping his glass, stopped.
“You are clinging.”
“No, I’m not.”
Haon retorted quickly.
“Denying it doesn’t change the fact.”
Haon let out a hollow laugh. Without realizing it, all his attention was focused on Cha Jeong-won, so he didn’t notice Cha Seo-jun’s gaze.
“If that’s what you think… Then you’re pitiful, sunbaenim.”
Only after the words left his mouth did he realize it was a mistake. Even if it was the alcohol talking, it was an expression that dangerously crossed a line.
“Pitiful?”
His voice dropped ever so slightly.
“I-I mean…”
Haon lifted his glass. The beer foam touched his lips.
“You keep seeing me… as an Omega with ulterior motives toward you, sunbaenim.”
It was a bit ridiculous, the way he acted as if having intentions just because of that one trait marker, being an Omega, not an Alpha or a Beta.
A bitter smile naturally formed at the corner of his mouth.
“Even if all of that was truly a coincidence, the fact that you’re an Omega is the decisive blow.”
Cha Jeong-won didn’t back down an inch.
Because of that, in the midst of their tense standoff, Haon finally said what had been weighing on his mind.
“Anyway, I apologize for calling you pitiful.”
Then he set his glass down.
“But I’d like you to admit just one thing.”
“What is it?”
“That you coming here today wasn’t my doing, but your choice, sunbaenim.”
For a moment, their gazes clashed. Cha Seo-jun, caught in the middle, had a face full of things to say and his lips twitched, but Haon spoke first, causing him to close his mouth.
“It wasn’t me chasing you.”
He drove the point home quietly.
It felt like drawing a thick line between them.
He wanted to clearly define the boundary—where coincidence ended and choice began.
“Let’s just drink.”
In the end, instead of a proper answer, those words came back.
Cha Jeong-won grabbed the beer Cha Seo-won had brought. He had originally brought it to drink together, but in the atmosphere where it felt like it had been snatched away, Cha Seo-jun just raised his hand in the air, unable to do anything.
And Haon, who was equally frustrated, had no reason to refuse. It was actually what he had hoped for.
“Fine.”
Haon picked up his glass again.
“This isn’t the place to argue about who came first or whether it was a coincidence or not.”
Outwardly, it sounded like he was brushing it off lightly, but he subtly included how sensitive he himself was to such things.
Haon also grabbed a beer bottle from the next table and lightly clinked it against Cha Jeong-won’s bottle.
With a short clink, foam rose over the beer bottles.
They both tilted their bottles almost simultaneously.
“Is this how it’s going to be?”
Cha Seo-jun’s muttering drifted away.
＊ ＊ ＊
One glass. Two glasses.
Sometimes drinking draft beer, sometimes chugging straight from the bottle…
There was no conversation, and the pace of drinking sped up.
“Sunbaenim, you can really hold your liquor.”
Haon, whose eyes were slightly reddened, said with a laugh. He said it after looking at the bottles gathered near Cha Jeong-won. And that was only after Cha Seo-jun had discreetly cleared them away once.
“You too.”
The short reply had an ambiguous tone, unsure if it was praise or a warning.
Haon looked at his own spot. There had been an empty bottle there just a moment ago. It’s gone.
“I’ll leave some tissues and wet wipes here separately, so ask if you need more. And have some snacks too.”
The owner of the hand that cleared the bottles nagged.
“Snacks are the liquor.”
Spouting nonsense about liquor eating liquor, Haon looked at Cha Jeong-won with eyes that were only half-open.
He looks fine. In fact, his face looked more relaxed than when he was ambushed in the elevator this morning.
“Aren’t you drunk?”
“Not particularly.”
Haon rested his chin on the back of his hand. Hot blood rushed to his face, making the inside of his cheeks feel flushed.
“If you’re that strong, why didn’t you want to drink earlier?”
“None of your business.”
“Should I take a guess?”
He said it playfully, but it sounded strangely suggestive even to his own ears.
“Because it seemed like something might happen.”
Cha Jeong-won, who had been about to lift his beer glass, looked at Haon.
Haon gave Cha Jeong-won a subtle smile. Having drunk, he was in a state where many of the world’s fears had disappeared.
“Because a drunk sunbaenim becomes dangerous.”
It was a statement that could be interpreted with a double meaning. His heart beat a little faster.
Things like Alpha instincts or pheromone reactions—they both knew without having to say it out loud.
Haon leaned back against the chair. A laugh escaped him.
“You’re the one.”
Cha Jeong-won emptied his glass once and slowly continued.
“You’re already prepared to blame me if you get drunk.”
“Wow…”
So you want to give it a try?
“Sunbaenim always pegs me as the culprit from the start. You don’t believe me even if I say it’s a coincidence, you don’t believe me even if I say I avoided you.”
Haon’s eyes, which had been swaying irregularly, suddenly became clear at some point.
“Why don’t you consider the opposite?”
He tilted his head slightly.
“The opposite could be that you did those things because you wanted to see me, sunbaenim.”
He spoke clearly and deliberately, as if he had to make this point.
“Like earlier.”
Haon was just walking down the street. Just then, Cha Jeong-won appeared in a taxi.
“The one who dropped right in front of me was you, sunbaenim.”
From the very first meeting.
His voice was mixed with drunkenness, but it was a somewhat valid suspicion.
“You said you weren’t coming today, but you came.”
The fact that he remembered so clearly when he had encountered Cha Jeong-won and what had happened then made his head spin even more.
“And not only did you come…”
Haon’s fingertip tapped the table once.
“You had to come to the corner table where I was sitting… Even so, are you innocent, sunbaenim?”
“You’re quite arrogant.”
Cha Jeong-won retorted as if he’d been waiting.
“I knew you’d say that.”
Haon chuckled.
“But just as you suspect me, I have the right to suspect you to this extent, right?”
For a moment, their gazes crossed.
It was impossible to tell who looked away first.
Cha Seo-jun, caught in the middle, cautiously observed the situation.
“You both seem drunk, how about calling it a night?”
Not only that, Cha Seo-jun tried to dissuade Cha Jeong-won first.
“You don’t usually drink this much. Stop drinking.”
Then he turned to look at Haon.
“I had a lot to talk about with Haon sunbaenim today, you can’t drink more. Absolutely not. I wanted to hear about your university life and get advice from you, sunbaenim.”
His tone was full of regret, but it was obvious that today was already a lost cause.
“If I’d known it would be like this, I wouldn’t have brought Jeong-won hyung.”
That was exactly how Haon felt. Why did you bring him?
“Enough.”
Cha Jeong-won set down the bottle he was holding. The sound of the beer bottle touching the table was dull.
It seemed his words were directed at Cha Seo-jun, but his gaze was firmly fixed on Haon.
“Enough of what?”
“Useless imagination.”
Haon looked at Cha Jeong-won with a face full of things to say.
Isn’t that what I should be saying? Who’s the one pushing me with strange ideas!
“I didn’t come here today because of you.”
“I can vouch for that. He said he wasn’t coming, and I dragged him here by force. I begged and pleaded with hyung because if not this year, we wouldn’t be able to have a welcome party together.”
Cha Seo-jun raised his hand and interjected.
“…Of course, I regret it now.”
He ignored the small whisper that followed. Anyway, since Cha Jeong-won didn’t come to meet Haon, was there anything more to say here?
“Alright.”
Haon nodded slowly.
“Then, please just think of me as someone who happened to be sitting next to you.”
Then he pretended to toast again.
“Who happened to be on the stairs, happened to be in the elevator, happened to be at the welcome party table.”
Each time he mentioned what had happened, the memories of those moments vividly came back to Haon.
“Why do you phrase it like that.”
“Isn’t that a hundred times better than you concluding that I appeared on purpose, sunbaenim?”
It was a remark thrown out in annoyance, but it was sincere in its own way.
The drunkenness rose further. His chin grew gradually heavier.
Each time he lifted his head, the room lighting seemed to follow a beat late.
From the newbie table next to them, someone was shouting for a bottoms-up.
Compared to the noisy singing, laughter, and clinking of glasses, the conversation at this corner table gradually dwindled.
Instead, the glasses were emptied at a steady pace.
He had no idea how much he’d drunk.
At some point, even the taste of beer was all the same. It wasn’t sweet or bitter.
Haon felt strange himself.
He seemed to have already passed his usual alcohol tolerance, so why was he like this?
It didn’t take long to recall the reason. The alcohol, instead of disappearing over time, had accumulated in his body.
It was because he had taken a suppressant before coming to the pub, making his senses duller than usual.
So what was dulled wasn’t the drunkenness itself, but the sense of perceiving the drunkenness.