TWELVE 50

“Seungkyung-ah.”

I thought I heard a voice calling my name from somewhere. It was only later that I recognized it as the sound of Gi Seoin waking me up. Immediately after prying my stiff eyes open, the first thing I faced was a gray wall.

“Woo Seungkyung is awake.”

No, that wasn’t a wall; it was Gi Seoin’s chest, clad in a gray T-shirt.

“Ah… what time is it?”

“9:40.”

As soon as I heard the time, my body sat up instinctively.

“Gi Seoin! Didn’t you go to work?”

My voice grew loud with surprise. However, Gi Seoin remained lying on his side, just grinning. Is it the weekend? No, it’s not.

Gi Seoin, who wrapped his arm around my back and made me lie back down, said:

“We decided to rest for the time being.”

“…Right, we did.”

Gi Seoin decided to move to the law firm that had offered him a position. However, he apparently negotiated to start official work in a month. I only heard the reason was that he ‘wanted to rest,’ but it seemed like it wasn’t entirely unrelated to me. Since he was a guy who already had a track record of taking leave to nurse me, it was a reasonable suspicion.

If it were before, I would have said it’s better to go to work as soon as possible and adjust quickly, but this time, I just told him to do as he wished.

Gi Seoin is on the taciturn side and doesn’t talk much, but it must have been difficult for him. He must have agonized and struggled immensely to break away from the parents who abused him. Right now, I just wanted to stay by his side and be a source of strength. Just as Gi Seoin had done for me.

Above all, Gi Seoin didn’t seem to know how to rest. While I might not know about other things, I could teach him how to rest very well. It was a perfect situation. I pulled the blanket up again.

“Then let’s roll around a bit more before we get up.”

“Okay.”

“But what time did you wake up?”

“5:00.”

“5:00 in the morning?”

For someone who had quit his job to wake up at that hour, Gi Seoin had clearly become a bit broken from living too busily.

“Please don’t tell me you went to work out and then lay back down on the bed.”

“How did you know?”

“Wow… You’re really going to be in big trouble if you keep that up, Seoin-ah.”

Gi Seoin had an expression that asked what on earth I was talking about. I intended to explain it kindly to him.

“They say a person has a limit to the energy they can use in a lifetime. When you use it all up, you die. But if you live diligently like you? You’re using energy fast. Then what happens?”

“A short life?”

“Exactly. Do you see the danger now? Don’t live too hard. When you rest, you have to know how to rest.”

“Where did you see that?”

“What? The energy thing? Just…”

Where did I see it?

“I think I saw it on ‘The Secrets of Life, Aging, Sickness, and Death’.”

At that, Gi Seoin chuckled.

“I should report this to the broadcasting station.”

“Report what?”

“That a health program is spreading false information.”

“It’s not false information!”

Or maybe it is. Regardless, I think it’s not an entirely wrong story. There exists a limit to what a human can endure. Some people encourage others to surpass their limits, but if something goes wrong, are they going to take responsibility?

To cut a long story short, I just wished for Gi Seoin to become comfortable.

“Anyway, since you decided to rest, try to rest properly. Working out, huh? You can rest from that too. Nothing bad will happen.”

“My body actually feels stiff if I don’t work out.”

“That’s an illusion. Your body is probably screaming for you to let it rest even now.”

“Then, should I lie down?”

“Yeah. Lie down, lie down. Good, well done.”

After semi-forcibly making Gi Seoin lie down, I even tucked him in neatly with the blanket. Seeing him stay still, he looked like a baby and was quite cute.

I’ve felt this lately, but Gi Seoin surprisingly has a charming side and tends to act a bit spoiled. How frustrated must he have been while acting as blunt as a robot all this time? It makes me feel sorry for him.

“My little puppy, shall I sing you a lullaby?”

“Sing it for me.”

“Okay, okay. Lullaby, lullaby, our baby. Sleeping so well, our baby. Don’t bark, little doggy, lest our baby wakes up…”

“I’m not falling asleep though.”

“I just started. Close your eyes and listen.”

“More than that.”

Gi Seoin moved closer and hugged me.

“This is more effective.”

Perhaps because he had washed up after working out, the scent of shampoo was strong. I had felt this before, but he was like a sponge that absorbed good scents and made them even better. Even soap that was just mediocre when I used it would give off a perfume-like fragrance when he used it.

“Gi Seoin, you’re like a child.”

I said while giggling. I hesitated before hugging him back. I wondered if it was a bit hot, but it also felt just right, and I felt like I was falling asleep again.

We did nothing for a long time while holding each other. The feeling of staying in the same time and space as Gi Seoin reassured me. Peace comes so easily…

Come to think of it, I haven’t had a panic attack recently. There wasn’t even a sign of one. I could be certain it was all thanks to Gi Seoin.

It would be greedy to wish for every day to be like this.

They say once you like someone, you become greedy.

As soon as I thought that, a noise rang out in the room as if mocking me.

“Is someone calling?”

When I asked Gi Seoin, he furrowed his brows slightly and said:

“I turned the sound off on mine.”

Then that meant the starting point of this noise was my mobile phone. After hurriedly fumbling around with my eyes and hands, I found the phone vibrating under the pillow.

[Jeon Juseok]

I thought it had been quiet lately. The timing of this contact after a long time is truly impeccable. At this point, it wouldn’t be strange if he were monitoring me.

I didn’t want to pick up, but since I was in a situation where I was postponing the debt repayment, I couldn’t do that. A person who borrowed money was a sinner even if they were paying it back well, or otherwise an even greater sinner.

“I’ll take the call for a moment.”

“Who is it?”

“Juseok-hyung.”

Gi Seoin didn’t say anything more. I pressed the call button.

“Yeah, hyung.”

—Little brother.

‘Little brother’? I got goosebumps from the very beginning. I felt it was suspicious from the moment he readily postponed the repayment, and it seems to be getting weirder as it goes. Then again, since he’s a guy who isn’t normal to begin with, even if he gets weirder, it’s six of one and half a dozen of the other.

—How have you been?

“Yeah… you, hyung?”

—As for me, well, fuck, I’m just busting my ass every day.

“Is something wrong?”

That meant, specifically for Jeon Juseok, the same thing as ‘What do you want?’.

—Nothing much, same as always.

“Ah…”

—I just called because I was curious if our Seungkyung’s broken limbs are healing well. Why, you got a problem with that?

“No, thanks for worrying about me.”

—And, Seoin is doing well too, right?

He says ‘Seoin.’ It was absurd.

With this, I could know his business. I glanced at Gi Seoin. He was lying face down on the bed, looking at me with an expressionless face. He must be listening to the call. It was a distance where he could hear everything.

“Uh, yeah. He’s doing well.”

—I was thinking of treating you guys to a meal this evening. Come out together.

“Huh? You, hyung?”

—He’s taking care of my little brother, so as the hyung, I should do at least that much, shouldn’t I?

What?

The things he was babbling about were nothing but words that could never come out of Jeon Juseok’s mouth, and should never come out.

—Why aren’t you answering? Hello? Ah, shit, I should either change my phone or something. Hello? Hey!

When I didn’t answer, Jeon Juseok blamed his own mobile phone. It was a relief that I could buy time through the misunderstanding. I muted the microphone and looked back at Gi Seoin.

“That… Juseok-hyung says he wants to have dinner tonight, should I just refuse appropriately?”

Gi Seoin isn’t the outgoing type, so he doesn’t prefer meeting strangers. From what I knew, that was the case, and since Jeon Juseok’s impression wasn’t very good to him either, I naturally thought he would tell me to do so.

However, that expectation was missed this time as well.

“Tell him let’s meet.”

“What? Why?”

“He’s your family.”

“There are all kinds of family…”

He must have hung up and called back in the meantime. I looked at those three characters of the name ‘Jeon Juseok’ on the screen and then cast my gaze back at Gi Seoin.

Gi Seoin just gestured toward my phone as if there was no change in his thoughts. Since even he was acting like that, the strength to devise another way vanished.

—Agh, fuck! Is my phone broken, or is your phone broken?

“I don’t know. The call must have been strange for a moment.”

—So, do you have time in the evening? Or not?

“Uh… okay. I’ll tell Seoin too. Where should we meet?”

—There’s a place called ‘Palace’ near where you live. Come there. By 8 o’clock.

After hanging up the call and looking it up, it was only a 10-minute walk from Gi Seoin’s house. I felt uneasy because it seemed like he had deliberately set the meeting place near here. Should I consider it a relief that he didn’t suddenly say he needed to check the house?

“Listen. Since hyung said he’s buying dinner, don’t pay.”

I hesitated whether to say it or not, but eventually urged Gi Seoin. No matter how you looked at it, Jeon Juseok was approaching him after seeing Gi Seoin’s wealth. To begin with, he should not show any goodwill so that the guy would give up quickly.

Moreover, even if my money was one thing, I couldn’t stand the sight of Gi Seoin’s money going into that jerk’s pocket.

“Understand?”

“I’m going to pay if I can.”

“That’s why, don’t do it.”

There was no way to stop the sigh.

I didn’t want to bring up bad stories if possible, but I ended up talking about it in detail.

“You must have felt it too, but he’s not a very good person. There’s no need to show goodwill for no reason.”

“But he’s your family.”

“I don’t think of him as family.”

“Really?”

“I’ve never thought of him that way, not even once. No, I did believe him for a moment when he said he would help me at first… I was a fool.”

I was badmouthing Jeon Juseok, but for some reason, it felt like I was revealing my own flaws, which made me feel embarrassed.