MOON Ch 11

Yeonjun carefully brought an ice pack to Chaeon’s cheek.

“Ugh…”

As Chaeon winced at the stinging, throbbing sensation, Yeonjun—who had been gazing at her coldly—narrowed the distance even further and sat closer to her.

“Did you avoid me all this time to hide this?”

“Pardon?”

“I haven’t seen you for a few days. Not even at the sponsorship center.”

Although she had been avoiding him in the first place because she didn’t want to run into him often, the moment she realized he knew everything, she didn’t know how to react. Yeonjun leaned his head back against the backrest, staring quietly at her.

“I went out often.”

“…”

“To see you.”

As Yeonjun gazed at her with eyes gently curving, Chaeon blinked in instant fluster.

“Just kidding.”

Yeonjun chuckled and playfully shook the hair scattered over his forehead. At his much lighter demeanor, Chaeon also let out a slightly awkward smile. Soon erasing his laughter, Yeonjun wrapped one hand around Chaeon’s uninjured cheek, while gently stroking her fiercely swollen cheek with the other hand, whispering:

“Must have hurt.”

His eyes wrinkled as if out of genuine sympathy, making her heart surge for some reason. How long had it been since she received such earnest attention or heard someone worry about her?

“I’m okay.”

The moment she spat those words out, she was, like a lie, not okay at all. Hot with mounting sorrow, the corners of Chaeon’s eyes quickly turned red and welled up with tears. Though she had endured and endured, pressing down hard on everything that had accumulated, at a single piece of warm concern, it felt as though the dam was about to burst and crumble.

“Chaeon-a.”

“…”

Peering into Chaeon’s damp eyes with a subtle expression, Yeonjun asked in a low voice:

“Is someone bullying you?”

Every word of his gentle call and question was soft and tender.

However, confessing the fact that she was hated by someone was a somewhat more complex problem than simply enduring being hated. Enduring sharp, jagged emotions when it wasn’t even her fault made her feel a bit aggrieved by the paradoxical situation—as if those moments were announcing that she was somehow flawed.

“Not ready to talk?”

As his low, resonating voice seemed to seep all the way into her heart, Chaeon bit her lip tightly and shook her head. Yeonjun let out a soft sigh and wiped the corners of her eyes with his thumb.

“If it’s hard to talk about, don’t.”

His clear, light brown pupils reflected Chaeon like a mirror. Opening the cap of the medicine he had brought and squeezing a bit of ointment onto his fingertip, Yeonjun gently placed his finger on Chaeon’s cheek.

“Tell me if it hurts.”

“…”

“Okay?”

“Yes…”

Chaeon replied with a choked voice, nodding her head. Except for her mother, Heejung, this was the first time she had experienced such warmth and gentleness from another person, making her repeatedly choke up. Was this what it meant to be starved for affection? Her small Adam’s apple moved up and down as she swallowed the hot lump rising in her throat.

Gently, softly. While Yeonjun smoothly spread the ointment, Chaeon held her breath completely, watching as his pale pupils moved toward her, hid beneath his eyelids again… and repeated this for a while. Every time his breath touched the tip of her nose and tickled her, a corner of her heart tickled along with it.

For a moment, another face—one that used to sweep over her with a cold, dry gaze—was overlaid on top of his. They really are so different. If she felt like a trapped beast in front of that man, she felt strangely at ease in front of this person.

Having been absorbed in applying the medicine in silence for a while, he spoke up.

“Still, if it gets too hard, tell me. If you just keep suppressing it, it’ll turn into an illness.”

He spoke as if he were someone who had gone through such a thing himself. Yeonjun tilted his head slightly to check the area where the medicine had been applied, and added quietly:

“I know because I’ve experienced it.”

“Young Master, you’ve had an experience like that?”

“…Young Master.”

Finding that title a bit amusing, he covered his mouth slightly and laughed, then narrowed his eyes and glanced sideways at Chaeon.

“Do you mean something like, a young master looks like he’s never suffered a day in his life?”

“No, that’s not it.”

Chuckling as he looked at the helix of Chaeon’s ear turning pink, Yeonjun whispered softly:

“I’ve had a lot of minor illnesses ever since I was little.”

At these unexpected words, Chaeon’s eyes widened roundly. “Hmm, I didn’t mean to surprise you,” he muttered softly to himself, and after hesitating a bit, he opened his mouth.

“To be honest, I still hyperventilate sometimes.”

“…”

“So I don’t go outside the house often. Naturally, I don’t have many people I can truly open up to.”

With every word that followed, it was full of contents she had never expected at all. Not knowing how to react, Chaeon listened quietly to his words, clutching the hem of her skirt tightly as she offered a small apology in a tiny voice.

“I’m sorry, I think I asked for no reason.”

“Why are you sorry? I said it because I wanted to.”

Looking intently at the flustered Chaeon with unreadable eyes, Yeonjun gave a faint smile.

“If you’re really sorry, shall we do this from now on?”

Peering into Chaeon’s eyes, which were still moist with leftover moisture, he whispered softly:

“Don’t avoid me.”

“…”

“Whether it’s you or me, if something comes up that troubles our hearts, let’s talk about it.”

“Ah…”

“Instead, tell only me.”

“…”

“Because I’ll tell only you, too.”

That voice was terribly low and smooth, as if telling a very secret secret. Swept up in a strange sensation, Chaeon looked at Yeonjun. A man who looked as though he had been crafted from only fine and sweet things, whispering words that were just as sweet.

Belonging to a realm she wondered if she would ever cross paths with in her entire life, his unhesitating extension of a hand made this situation feel somewhat like a dream. Silence flowed between the two of them for a while.

Tick, tick.

Around the time when only the sound of the second hand turning on the wall clock in Yeonjun’s room was filling the space for a while.

“Can I… really do that?”

Hesitating, Chaeon answered like a breath.

Always, she had not wanted to get close to things she could not possess. She knew Uicheol, who had met a futile end after coveting something beyond his station, and she clearly remembered how much she had despised him. That was why she hadn’t wanted to create even the slightest connection with people who seemed to live in a world different from hers.

…And yet.

“Yes. Of course.”

“…”

A tiny greed arose. To enjoy the gentleness and attention Yeonjun was pouring out right now just a little bit more. Since neither this nor that worked out according to her wishes anyway—couldn’t she be involved with a person like this at least once in her life?

“…I will.”

“Hm?”

“I’ll tell you… everything. I won’t avoid you, either.”

The moment she spat out her answer with such a mindset, her heart beat violently. To her, this moment felt like a small deviation.

“Alright.”

Just as he smiled gently and was about to reach out toward Chaeon again—

Knock, knock. Someone knocked lightly on the door from outside, and Yeonjun, whose face returned to an expressionless state as if nothing had happened, turned his gaze there.

“Excuse me, Young Master. Ma’am is looking for you.”

“…”

A flicker of annoyance seemed to pass through Yeonjun’s eyes for a second, but a neat reply followed:

“Tell her I’ll be there shortly.”

“Yes, understood.”

The footsteps beyond the door gradually grew distant, and Yeonjun’s gaze slowly returned to Chaeon again.

“Sorry. I had a quick task to do today, but I forgot about it.”

“No, it’s alright. And…. thank you.”

As he stared at Chaeon, who bowed her head politely, Yeonjun also stood up from his seat afterward.

“Shall we head out together?”

“Yes.”

Yeonjun nodded and led the way, and just as Chaeon was about to turn around to follow him, her eyes inadvertently fell upon something on top of the desk, causing her to pause and scowl her eyes.

Since her eyesight wasn’t very good, she couldn’t see clearly, but sticking out among the papers scattered on top of the desk was definitely a photograph. Containing the image of a male student wearing a familiar school uniform…

The moment she tried to take a step toward it without realizing, Yeonjun called Chaeon softly.

“Chaeon-a.”

“Ah, yes.”

Flinching as she looked back, Yeonjun opened the door to the room with a smile hanging on his smooth lips.

“Let’s go.”

…Did she see it wrong?

Tilting her head, Chaeon stepped out the door he opened for her. And that tiny bit of wonder soon evaporated the moment she saw his face smiling at her.

She had never let anyone deep into her heart, but she felt like she could trust someone this gentle. It was the moment she opened her heart to another person for the very first time.