SWAP 87

Since I didn’t know what he meant, I just stared blankly, so he shook his wrist once as if asking what I was doing. It felt exactly like a nuance suggesting we should hold hands, so I almost grabbed it instinctively.

However, Seoul, who regained his senses with a start due to the VJ who burst through the gate at the perfect timing, clenched his fists. His heart pounded at the situation where he almost did something strange on the street.

Saheon, looking down at such a Seoul, stared at the staff with a chilly gaze. Facing an atmosphere that treated them like the ultimate interrupters, the two assigned VJs naturally felt wronged. It’s not like they weren’t the ones who had been caught off guard and came running out in a hurry. Even if they passed on a scene of Seo Saheon jogging alone, how could they not pursue him when he was dragging Lee Seoul out in that state? It was a scene even a passing puppy friend of Seo Saheon would have borrowed its owner’s phone to film…!

Regardless of that, Saheon turned his head away spitefully and picked up the phone purchased in his name to start moving his fingers. Just as Seoul guessed, the screen couldn’t be captured by the observation cameras, so they hurriedly fixed the lens angle, having received a special mission from PD Jeon Jaeyeon to make sure they captured the content.

Memo Completed

Hold my hand so I don’t get lost |

Soon, the notepad with the concise sentence written on it was thrust in front of Seoul. He had wondered if that might be it, but he hadn’t expected him to actually put his hand out asking to hold it, so he was flustered. Seoul, wearing a troubled expression, spoke softly.

“Why are you being like this all of a sudden? I told you I can’t run as fast as you…”

“……”

“I’ll be waiting at home, so go by yourself. Then later—”

Memo Completed

Should I buy a leash? |

His momentum was broken by just four syllables. A horrified Seoul hurriedly covered the screen with his palm, but it had already been captured by the camera. Without knowing that, Seoul bit his lip and glared sharply at Saheon. Leash, my foot—knowing he hated everything of that sort… it was an even more absurd threat because Seoul knew Saheon would throw it into the trash immediately if it were actually in front of him.

Anyway, only his mouth—no, only his fingers—were alive…

Seoul, who was grumbling only internally, eventually let out a deep sigh.

“If I hold it, will you go quietly…?”

A nod.

“Don’t do anything strange.”

Nod, nod.

“And please, keep the jokes within reason…”

A tilt of the head.

“……”

He was nodding along fine but feigned ignorance only at the last part. Looking at Saheon, who refused to promise he wouldn’t pull any pranks even if it killed him, Seoul shook his head as if giving up and stretched out his arm. As soon as he lightly grasped the large hand, fingers intertwined as if they had been waiting. He flinched because Saheon dug between his knuckles and firmly locked their fingers together. He had planned to just roughly lead him along as if barely holding on, but he hadn’t known they would hold hands so officially.

He tried to rebuke him quietly with a “Hey,” but Saheon didn’t even pretend to hear.

As if this situation was fun, he whistled softly and stepped ahead.

Seoul hurried toward him as his arm was pulled, matching his speed. Looking to his side, a brilliant light had found its way onto that already handsome face. The corners of his mouth were curved smoothly as if he had never been sulking and slumped over the table. At the sight of Saheon, who had clearly become happy to anyone watching, the nagging Seoul was about to pour out melted away like wet cotton candy.

Seoul, who felt as if he had been doused in sugar water like a bolt from the blue, subtly turned his gaze away.

While grumbling that a face like that was cheating, he kept glancing back again and again.

What does he eat to be this sparkly? Maybe when he was young, but now that he’s grown, he eats the same thing every day. Even just now, the only thing he put in his mouth was a single apple. Yet, thoughts like “it’s just fascinating how his surroundings shine like gold dust” followed one after another like a string of candies.

He was clearly in a state of mental confusion due to a sugar spike, but Seoul didn’t notice, and Saheon, feeling the gaze that kept touching him ticklishly, naturally turned his head. What is this now? Every look Seoul gave him as he peered up was soft and sweet. Whether he really intended to treat him like a dog or just a palm-sized puppy, Saheon found it absurd and cute, and it was at the moment he was gently rubbing the knuckles of their intertwined hands.

The VJ who popped out from behind pushed the camera in without any sense.

Saheon’s face, which was about to start an apiary, instantly met an ice age.

“……”

“……”

The honeybees, having all frozen to death, crashed to the ground. Seoul’s assigned VJ, who had approached too closely out of a thorough professional spirit, quickly stepped back three paces. It was an almost instinctive retreat. Anyone would do that if the genre suddenly switched from a romantic comedy to a horror thriller.

Mansu, Saheon’s assigned VJ who witnessed this, was clicking his tongue in the back. See, I told you not to get too close. Even though it was advice written in blood, he wouldn’t listen. Having been filming from a distance, Mansu already regarded Seo Saheon as something of an evil spirit.

If you could capture him on camera, the views would explode, but if you happened to get on his nerves, something close to a curse would happen, so it wasn’t entirely wrong. Having already experienced many things, he was framing the shot with an enlightened face when he saw Seoul peeking back this way.

Seoul’s lips flickered as if he wanted to say something, but he was dragged along with a “Whoa,” due to Saheon intentionally pulling his hand to increase speed. Since this kind of situation had happened more than once or twice, he just laughed heartily like PD Jeon. Then, taking his frozen junior with him, he hurriedly followed after the two.

He felt relieved, thinking it was a good thing Seoul was by his side… but exactly 20 minutes later, the situation began to flow unexpectedly.

“…Did we come all the way here?”

Seoul muttered in surprise at the familiar mart sign visible in the distance. He thought Saheon would make him run until he puked as revenge, but those worries were put to shame as they bickered and walked, and before he knew it, they were here because Saheon acted as if they were truly just taking a stroll. While he was dumbfounded at the fact that he ended up coming by foot, Seoul, performing a “mind change” that it was for the better since things turned out this way, suggested some light grocery shopping.

It was just when he was contemplating the lunch menu.

Hadn’t he made a grand promise to Saheon that he would make him whatever menu he wanted to eat? When he suggested they buy a few necessary ingredients and head back, Saheon looked at Seoul with a peculiar expression. There was a hint of him suppressing a laugh, but Seoul, who didn’t notice that far, was lost in eccentric worries about what human food a puppy could eat.

“Samgyetang… is too heavy because I’d have to buy a chicken.”

“……”

“Huh? Is it okay? Ah, a taxi? …Right. Since you can ride in cars now, we can just go back by taxi.”

“……”

“Should we buy fruit too? …Are there still strawberries? You can eat strawberries.”

In the meantime, Seoul, who had become able to infer Saheon’s answers even without a reply, entered the mart while busily chatting to himself. When he pulled a cart over, Saheon familiarly grabbed the handle and pulled, and thus the two went straight to the grocery section. After deciding to buy some herbal ingredients, some vegetables, and finally a chicken, Seoul was looking at onions with Saheon when the surroundings suddenly became noisy.

What is it? It was just when he subtly lifted his head with a curious mind.

Seoul, coming face-to-face with dozens of eyes staring at him, couldn’t help but flinch instinctively.

“Uh…”

What kind of place is a mart at 10:30 AM?

It was a space no different from a runway for housewives who came early to shop for the whole family’s meals. Most of them stayed at a distance, thinking it was a shoot after seeing the production team deployed on both sides, but those who discovered Seoul had a different kind of footwork.

‘Oh my, oh my! Isn’t that Lee Seoul over there?’

‘What? Huh… it is. Goodness, it really is!’

With that appearance and cameras trailing behind him, it was harder not to stand out. With faces like someone who had encountered a puffed-rice vendor on a completely jammed highway, they approached the vegetable section as if they had rehearsed it. Seoul, who had been diligently picking out only onions without knowing, could only open his eyes wide at the sight of the beautiful middle-aged women who suddenly appeared.

Sigh, maybe it’s because they’ve watched him since he was so young.

His face, like a baby angel’s whose baby fat hadn’t even fully disappeared, was so vivid that even that felt cute to them. Fans were busy crying, saying they didn’t know if our actor was dead or alive, but it wasn’t like that for these women. Whenever they turned on the television, he appeared everywhere, so what was the problem? With a bit of exaggeration, they saw Lee Seoul more often than their own grown children.

Naturally, their internal intimacy with Seoul couldn’t help but hit the maximum and pierce through the ceiling. Clasping his hands while saying “Oh my, Mr. Seoul” was by no means pretending to be close. They just were close.

Only then did Seoul belatedly realize the fact that he wasn’t wearing a mask, and his eyes went wide. While he was momentarily flustered by the sudden crowd, he began to accept their greetings with a friendly smile, and that was when one of the housewives, who was smiling but glancing to the side with a strangely odd look, spoke up.

“Umm, but why is the person next to you like that?”

“Pardon?”

Seoul, who had been hectically accepting greetings, turned his head to the side without thinking. And then he realized.

The puppy ears on top of Saheon’s head…