By Zephyria Lee-eum tossed and turned before slowly opening his eyes. He remembered meeting Choi Won-joon and falling asleep on the way home, but when he woke up, he was in a car. Seeing the seat reclined all the way back, he must have slept like a log.
As Lee-eum sat up, he was speechless at the sight before him. He thought he heard the sound of waves in his sleep, but it wasn’t his imagination. In the bluish darkness before dawn, waves crashed and broke into white foam, creating a spectacular view.
He splashed water on his face to clear his head and looked around. Choi Won-joon was nowhere to be seen, either in the driver’s seat or outside the car. Dozens of messages from his friends were piled up on his phone. He took it and stepped outside, and then he heard Choi Won-joon’s voice in the distance.
“You’re awake?”
“What is this? Why the sea?”
“You said you wanted to see the sea.”
Thinking hard, he seemed to have said something similar while drunk before falling asleep. Most detectives didn’t have long vacations, and Lee-eum always had major cases breaking out during his vacations, so he never got a proper one. Choi Won-joon had asked him when his vacation was, and he remembered replying that he probably wouldn’t have one, but he still wanted to see the sea.
“But where are you coming from?”
“I was looking around to see if there were any decent restaurants. Luckily, I found a few.”
“Why a restaurant?”
“You need to get rid of your hangover, Darling.”
Lee-eum snorted. He boasted that he didn’t need a hangover cure for just this much, but he soon felt a burning sensation in his stomach and had to frown. Choi Won-joon came closer, put the coffee he was holding on the car, and straightened Lee-eum’s crumpled shirt collar.
“Detective Kim. Please drink in moderation from now on. Okay? You have to live longer than me.”
“You’re older than me, President, so of course I’ll live longer, right?”
“There’s no order when it comes to going. Don’t be too complacent.”
Then he grabbed Lee-eum’s chin and examined it from side to side. How could he be so lovely even after waking up from sleep? Then he carefully wiped the corner of his mouth, saying he had drooled. Lee-eum was horrified and pushed his hand away, but he forcibly grabbed it and rubbed it until the end. Then Lee-eum noticed the horizon gradually turning red and was momentarily lost in thought.
“The sun is about to rise. It’s beautiful.”
“It is. Beautiful.”
Choi Won-joon muttered, looking at Kim Yi-eum’s face instead of the sunrise, and Lee-eum took Choi Won-joon’s coffee, feeling embarrassed for no reason. I’ll drink this. Meanwhile, Choi Won-joon took off his jacket and spread it on the sand.
“Come here. Let’s sit here, watch the sunrise, and make a wish.”
“I didn’t know you were into totemism, President. Last time, you wanted to make a wish to the moon, and this time it’s the sun? Are you going to make a wish to a tree next time?”
“You’re not one to talk, you even wrote an amulet to drive me away, didn’t you?”
Lee-eum was startled and turned around. Goosebumps. When he asked how he knew about that, Choi Won-joon frowned. He looked genuinely taken aback, as he was just trying to tease him, so Lee-eum subtly avoided his gaze.
“Wow, that’s too much.”
“No, it was understandable at the time… If someone like you, President, suddenly appeared in my life and acted arbitrarily, manipulating people, would you be able to stand it?”
“Are you saying you can stand it now?”
Lee-eum hesitated, about to retort. It wasn’t so much that he could stand it, but that he had gotten used to it. Like, oh, there are people like this too.
“Tell me. Huh? Can you stand me now? Can I believe that your affection has deepened that much?”
Choi Won-joon touched Lee-eum’s cheek, who was looking straight ahead, and turned his head to face him. Lee-eum lowered his gaze. As he paused to choose his words, Choi Won-joon’s lips lightly touched his and then moved away. Lee-eum looked up at Choi Won-joon’s face. The red sun poured down on his face, and a smile spread across his lips.
“Thank you. For giving affection to a bastard like me.”
“……”
“Ah, I should add a ‘slut’ too.”
“Are you trying to fight?”
Won-joon smiled and gently stroked Lee-eum’s cheek.
“I mean it. If it weren’t for you, I would have never known how to give proper affection to anyone until I died. Thank you for letting me know. I’ll be good to you for the rest of my life.”
He didn’t know why the word “lifetime” was attached to it, but it sounded strangely like a proposal. He didn’t feel anything even when he brought up marriage from time to time, but he couldn’t understand why his heart rate was accelerating this time. He buried half of his face between his knees, not wanting to be caught being embarrassed, and Choi Won-joon leaned his head on his shoulder.
In the meantime, the sun fully revealed its face and dyed the sea. It had turned completely red, to the point where it was hard to tell which was the sky and which was the sea. He wanted to capture the scenery, so he took out his cell phone to take a picture, but he glanced at Choi Won-joon.
“Do you want to take a picture together?”
“Can I?”
He did whatever he wanted without asking for permission, but why was he being shy about this? When he switched the screen, Choi Won-joon’s and his own faces were captured in the frame. Unlike Choi Won-joon, who was smiling naturally, Lee-eum’s lips were stiff.
“Are we taking a mugshot?”
When he glared at him for teasing, Choi Won-joon pressed the shutter button in that gap. He was about to delete it because it looked funny no matter who looked at it, but Choi Won-joon quickly snatched the phone and strode back.
“Don’t mess around and give it back!”
“I’m just going to transfer the picture to my phone.”
“Delete it when I’m asking nicely.”
“Can we enlarge this picture and hang it up big when we get married?”
“Ha.”
Enraged, he jumped up, and Choi Won-joon ran away without looking back. Thinking of Choi Won-joon as a criminal, he gained more speed than usual, and that’s why he was able to snatch Choi Won-joon in no time.
Lee-eum slammed Choi Won-joon into the sand with a hip throw, as if he was trying to vent all the resentment he had accumulated. Then he confiscated the phone and headed back to the car.
❖ ❖ ❖
“Why is your shirt like that?”
“Huh? Why?”
“It’s more wrinkled than usual. Did you catch a criminal somewhere?”
Lee-eum pursed his lips and made excuses that he was too busy to iron it. It was getting late, so he went straight to the police station from the sea instead of going home, but it seemed obvious that he hadn’t gone home.
Even before dropping him off in front of the police station, Choi Won-joon kept pestering him, asking if he couldn’t take the day off and play with him. If they were to get married like this, would he be like that every day? He suddenly had unnecessary worries, even though he wasn’t getting married anytime soon.
“Oh, the guys who swung the baseball bat at Sunbae have been caught. They’re in the detention center, you can see their faces later.”
“Why?”
“Team leader went crazy as soon as he came in. Detective Lee and I had a hard time stopping him from beating them to death. I guess it was all a lie that his knee joints weren’t good. He was even doing flying kicks.”
Lee-eum tried hard to suppress the laughter that was bursting out. On the one hand, he felt strangely relieved that the criminal had been caught without dying. He had repeatedly told Choi Won-joon not to get involved in this case, but he seemed to have understood.
Choi Won-joon liked an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, to a terrible extent. Good for good, evil for evil. Looking at him admitting that he was evil himself, he felt disturbed, but he himself didn’t care at all.
He had never secretly thrown trash on the street or crossed the street ignoring the signals since he was a child, so Choi Won-joon, who seemed to be a completely different creature from him, still didn’t understand. Would his mind be more at ease if he gave up trying to understand?
As he was thinking about this and that and looking for clothes to change into, someone knocked on the desk. He raised his head and saw Jeong Dae-han standing there with a happy face.
“Oh? Dae-han. What’s going on?”
“I was passing by because of work. Do you have time to talk for a bit?”
Lee-eum got up from his seat and went outside with him. He made coffee for Jeong Dae-han and stood on one side to talk, and it was more comfortable than he thought. He thought it would be awkward after they broke up like that last time, but it was an unnecessary worry. Jeong Dae-han was also treating him the same as before.
“Oh, I saw Hyung last time, and he looked good.”
Lee-eum smiled awkwardly. He wanted to tell him that Hyung was completely obsessed with Choi Won-joon these days, and he was about to start a fan club. Noona criticized him for switching sides like flipping a pancake, but when she drank, she sided with Hyung and praised Choi Won-joon. She used to hate him so much, but now she looked for Choi Won-joon more than her own brother, and sometimes he felt a little sad.
“How have you been? Nothing special?”
“I’ve been doing well without any problems. What about you?”
Lee-eum paused for a moment and honestly revealed his inner thoughts.
“I know you were very disappointed in me after we broke up like that last time. I’m sorry.”
He didn’t make any excuses. He couldn’t say that Choi Won-joon wasn’t as bad as he thought, because he really was a bad guy. Jeong Dae-han, who had been listening quietly, waved his hand and denied it.
“Disappointed? There’s no way. I still think you’re cool. No matter who you meet or what you do, you’re the coolest person I’ve ever seen. That won’t change. I wanted to say this after seeing your face. I also wanted to say that I want to remain good friends in the future.”
Lee-eum felt sorry and grateful at the same time. When he said thank you, Jeong Dae-han blushed and smiled. The two talked about some of the recent incidents, and the topic eventually flowed to Kim Ji-cheol.
“I heard you’re attending Kim Ji-cheol’s trial as a witness.”
“Yeah.”
“I know, but I heard that the lawyer on that side is digging into the relationship between you and Choi Won-joon.”
He had expected it to some extent. The prosecutor in charge had told him separately, and Choi Won-joon was also worried about that point. It would be a lie to say that he was okay, but he tried not to worry too much.
As if sensing his feelings, Jeong Dae-han cheered him on, saying that he would do well. In response, Lee-eum clenched his fist and smiled brightly.