By Zephyria 
Haon’s reaction was exactly as Hyo-jung had expected. She was certain that In-ho would not have found it easy to suggest going to the hospital.
“You said In-ho got angry when you mentioned going to the hospital.”
“I… I did?”
A flustered Haon asked back. He didn’t remember the details of the phone call he had with Hyo-jung in the early hours of the morning. He only recalled that he had made a call.
At the time, Haon had rambled incoherently while explaining the situation, but Hyo-jung had understood everything.
“He, he wasn’t exactly angry… it’s just that I kept insisting we go…”
“I understand the situation.”
Seeing Haon shrink back as if he had been scolded, Hyo-jung gave him a gentle smile. She felt she was beginning to understand why In-ho cared for him.
“In-ho doesn’t like hospitals.”
Hyo-jung walked around the bed and moved to face Haon. For a moment, she recalled In-ho’s warning not to say anything strange to Haon, but she ignored it. What she was about to say wasn’t “strange.”
“He was quite sick for a long time.”
As Haon straightened his upper body, the blanket slipped off his shoulders again.
“W-where was he…?”
Wearing thin-rimmed glasses, Hyo-jung looked at Haon. Pretending to push up her glasses, she subtly scanned him.
He had a completely different aura from the Omegas In-ho had dated briefly in the past. As much as he seemed naive, he was actually young, but he appeared far more innocent than others his age. Even without a long conversation, his personality was evident.
Above all, he seemed to truly love In-ho. The image of Haon sitting on the waiting room chair barefoot remained strongly etched in Hyo-jung’s mind. The way he had looked around, lost in thought, was like a child who had lost both his home and his parents.
Looking at In-ho’s condition, it was clear that he was also sincere about Haon. The weight of his feelings was evident in the fact that he had taken suppressants so potent they put a strain on his heart.
He must have judged that a recessive Omega wouldn’t be able to handle his rut. Moreover, seeing how thin and physically weak Haon looked, it was understandable that he tried to endure it with medication. Though, as a doctor, she couldn’t condone it.
“Please tell me…”
While Hyo-jung was lost in thought for a moment, Haon, who had been anxious, spoke first.
“I… I don’t know anything about Mr. In-ho.”
His faint voice seemed to tremble with moisture. Haon strained his round eyes, trying his best not to cry.
It’s okay to cry. He seemed too accustomed to holding it in, like someone else she knew. Hyo-jung gave a small, eye-crinkling smile and continued her explanation.
“It’s not that his body is sick.”
She phrased it vaguely so he could understand it in his own way.
“Even though he’s lying here now, his body will recover quickly. As long as he manages his medication and stress well, he won’t collapse again.”
In truth, it was difficult for the body of a dominant Alpha to be damaged to this extent. It meant that In-ho had neglected his own health that much.
“Then…”
Haon trailed off and looked straight up at Hyo-jung. His soft brown eyes were shining clearly, as if he were ready to listen.
Despite that, Hyo-jung did not continue immediately. She took off her glasses, put them in her pocket, and rubbed the bridge of her nose. She remained silent for a moment as if choosing her words, then spoke without filtering. She believed this was something anyone staying by In-ho’s side needed to know.
“He was forcibly hospitalized when he was young. For about three months.”
This happened before In-ho manifested as a dominant Alpha.
Whenever Hyo-jung traveled to the U.S. with her family, she would occasionally meet In-ho. In her memory, In-ho was always a child who exuded a quiet and gloomy atmosphere. That didn’t mean he seemed particularly sick or unstable; he was simply less talkative than his siblings.
Then one day, she heard the news that In-ho had been admitted to a psychiatric ward.
‘Really?’
‘Yeah, why would I lie? Just you know. Don’t tell anyone.’
Since she heard it from Park Jung-hyuk, In-ho’s cousin, she didn’t fully believe it. It wasn’t easy to believe that a kid who was attending school normally had been forcibly hospitalized.
‘Why was he hospitalized?’
‘Because he kept putting on a show to go back to Korea. I heard he tried to slit his wrists in front of the principal. He’s completely crazy.’
‘No way…’
At that time, Hyo-jung didn’t know the details of In-ho’s situation. She wasn’t interested enough to look deeply into it.
If it’s true, that’s too bad. That was the extent of her emotion.
Around the time Hyo-jung returned to her daily life, she received a call from an unsaved number. She vividly remembered tilting her head while holding her phone, which rang while she was on her way to an academy.
Normally, she wouldn’t have answered. However, she unconsciously pressed the accept button, and an unexpected voice came through the phone she had answered without much thought.
‘Hyo-jung noona, it’s In-ho.’
The voice saying his name, Seo In-ho, was severely cracked.
She didn’t know how he got her phone number. The young Hyo-jung didn’t even have time to ask that and simply asked what was wrong. The two weren’t close enough to be calling each other. They had only met because their families knew each other.
‘Noona, please help me.’
But it seemed it was different for In-ho.
‘Please tell them I’m not sick.’
The clumsy voice sounded like it belonged to someone else.
‘I want to go home.’
For a moment, Hyo-jung thought the caller wasn’t In-ho, or that he had dialed the wrong number. She felt they weren’t in a relationship where he would make such a request.
‘Hyo-jung noona, please.’
But In-ho continued to call her name clearly. She was indeed the person he was pleading for help. The sensation of her eyes strangely heating up the moment she realized that was as vivid as if it had happened yesterday.
How lonely must he be to call me for help? That was what she thought.
‘Where are you?’
The moment Hyo-jung asked, the call was cut off.
“And then, three months later, I heard he was discharged.”
Fortunately, it was vacation time, so she went back to the U.S. with her family under the pretext of a trip. Before even unpacking, she went straight to see In-ho. He was at the boarding school he originally attended.
“But he didn’t remember.”
Leaning her back against the wall, Hyo-jung gazed blankly at In-ho lying on the bed.
“When I told him I was sorry for not being able to help back then…”
‘What for?’
The young In-ho looked up at the apologizing Hyo-jung and tilted his head. His expression truly looked as if he didn’t know what she was talking about. However, his gaunt face, which had become half its size in a few months, served as proof of the time he had endured.
‘I’ve been here the whole time.’
‘You were at school?’
‘Yeah, why?’
Only after a few more words of conversation did Hyo-jung realize he wasn’t pretending. So, she never mentioned that day again.
A few months after that, In-ho attempted suicide at school, and the following year, he manifested as a dominant Alpha. She thought his misfortune would end there.
“Even after becoming an adult, he frequently visited hospitals due to alcohol problems. His condition was that bad.”
Shifting her gaze to Haon’s face, Hyo-jung tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear. Haon was listening intently to Hyo-jung’s words, without any particular reaction.
“I’m telling you this now because he’s much better. In-ho is the type of person who would never say these things himself, even if he were dying.”
Whenever his condition worsened severely like this, he suffered from trauma, but he recovered quickly. In-ho was definitely getting better. By his own will, nothing else.
“This time, the dosage of suppressants was the biggest problem. As long as he manages his medication in the future, this won’t happen again.”
Hyo-jung checked her wristwatch, signaling she was about to end the conversation. By now, he should have a basic understanding of In-ho’s condition. Observing Haon’s expression, she changed the subject with a deliberately bright voice.
“When would be a good time for you to get your check-up, Haon?”
Haon, with his head lowered, fiddled with his hands and spoke in a faint voice.
“When… Mr. In-ho wakes up…”
“Alright, get it whenever it’s convenient for you, Haon.”
Looking at Haon, Hyo-jung rubbed the corner of her eyebrow. Was the story too heavy for the young Haon to hear? She wondered for a moment if her judgment had been wrong.
However, she felt more certain that if this was a relationship that would flee upon learning such a past, it was better to end it quickly. For the sake of both of them.
Then, Haon lifted his head and gulped down his juice.
After soothing his burning throat with the cool liquid, he looked up at Hyo-jung again. His round eyes, with thin burst capillaries, were moist. It seemed as if a single breeze would make the tears spill over.
“What… can I do for him?”
However, his voice was infinitely calm. He slowly closed and opened his eyes, and the redness gradually faded back to its original color.
He’s a stronger child than he looks. A shallow sense of relief colored Hyo-jung’s smile.
“Just being by his side will be a great strength.”
She spoke in a soft voice, looking back and forth between In-ho and Haon.
“Help him maintain a regular routine, but don’t treat him too much like a patient. And it’s best to stay away from alcohol.”
Haon nodded, folding his fingers one by one. He intended to remember everything and write it down in his phone.
“Since he’s lived with alcohol for so long, it’ll be hard to quit all at once, so just reducing it little by little is enough. Exercise together and find some hobbies.”
There was a limit to controlling emotions with medication. In-ho had to change his smallest daily habits. If In-ho were awake, he would have sneered, telling her not to say such obvious things while wearing a doctor’s gown.
But those obvious things were the most important. A regular, healthy life and time spent with a loved one.
Hyo-jung believed that those things alone could cure more than half of any illness.
“Still, he doesn’t go out drinking much these days, right?”
“He doesn’t go out at all.”
Haon’s voice became a bit clearer. That much was certain. Since he started living with Haon, In-ho had never come home after drinking.
At this, Hyo-jung raised an eyebrow and smiled. She thought that In-ho must really like Haon.
“In-ho seems quite decent on the surface, doesn’t he?”
Before leaving the room, Hyo-jung took one last close look at In-ho’s face. Aside from the fact that he looked like he had gained some weight, his face didn’t look like that of a patient.
“His looks go without saying, and he’s attentive, caring, and has a playful side.”
Instead of answering, Haon just nodded vigorously. Every word was a fact.
“That’s all just him reading the room.”
Haon’s nodding stopped abruptly.
“He’s just flattering you so you’ll look at him kindly, so express your feelings to him a lot.”
Checking the time, Hyo-jung headed for the door. She gave Haon her business card, telling him to contact her if he needed any help.
Haon immediately saved the number in his phone so he wouldn’t forget. Then, he slowly turned his head toward In-ho.
Even after Hyo-jung left, Haon maintained a calm expression. He didn’t cry anymore.
Taking a small breath, he wiped the sweat from his palms on his thigh. After clenching and unclenching his hands a few times, he reached out to hold In-ho’s hand.
At that moment, Haon’s phone rang.
“…….”
An unsaved number appeared on the lit-up screen. Haon answered the call just before the vibration stopped. The voice that leaked through his cracked lips was devoid of emotion.
“Who is this?”