ORCA 45

Even this morning, he didn’t have the courage to sneak a peek at the young master’s body as he flung off his gown. He had actually tried to look secretly, but it didn’t work out well. He failed every time, morning and evening. He could only open his eyes properly after hearing the splash.

He was now used to seeing the forearms or upper body that were above the water’s surface, but he didn’t have the courage to appreciate what was below that. It felt as though his impure thoughts would be shown unfiltered through the eyes that were looking at the young master. If he were to get caught, he would surely be called a pervert. So he wanted to look without getting caught, but there was no suitable way.

Niah, who was chewing his last piece of bacon and a roll, flinched and ducked his head low.

No, it’s not like, I really want to see it or anything… I want to see a little, just a little bit. The young master saw all of my body, so that’s why I want to see his too… That would be fair…

His cheeks flushed bright red as he mulled over the excuses no one had asked for. Harriet, who was sitting next to him, had been holding back but finally acknowledged him. It was understandable, as he went from grinning to looking gloomy, and finally ended up flushed red and whimpering. She lowered her voice and placed a hand on Niah’s forehead.

“Niah. Is something wrong? Are you sick somewhere? Do you have a fever…”

“Huh, what? No! I wasn’t thinking about anything!”

“Hmm? About what?”

Niah became even more surprised by his own words and looked miserable. Harriet patted his shoulder comfortingly first. It was obvious, without even having to hear it, that it was something related to the young master. Niah put down his fork, cupped his hands, and pressed them to her ear. She leaned her body slightly to the side to focus on the small words she was hearing.

“Harriet… What do I do… I, I think I’m a real pervert…”

“What?”

She raised her voice. Because of that, the gazes of all the surrounding servants at the other tables were fixed in one place. Among them were Andrian’s sharp horns and Pepe’s steely eyes.

Suddenly caught up in a ‘pervert’ dilemma, Harriet was extremely perplexed. She hadn’t known Niah had such a concern, and she couldn’t gauge how much she could interfere. Now that she had already heard it, she couldn’t pretend she didn’t know. It seemed she had now undoubtedly become a matchmaker. Moreover, a persistent matchmaker who would tenaciously interfere, hoping for success.

The two walked side by side down a deserted corridor. It was one of the corridors that the servants hardly used unless there was a special reason. In the corner path that wrapped around the mansion, only the sound of Niah and Harriet whispering could be heard.

“So to sum it up… You keep thinking about him when he’s not around, you can’t work properly when he is, time flies by, you can’t sleep well, and on top of that, you have no appetite?”

Niah, who had vaguely confessed his inner thoughts, nodded his head vigorously. His hair flew up and down. His gaze towards Harriet was desperate. He clasped his hands together without realizing it. He needed a solution that would magically—poof!—cure his difficult situation.

At the action that made it clear what he wanted from her, Harriet subtly looked elsewhere. The expression puffed up with expectation was burdensome. It wasn’t as if she had asked because she had a brilliant plan. But it was a rather cute worry, so she wracked her brain as much as she could.

“Umm… right… I see. But isn’t this similar to what’s been happening until now? It’s not like it’s been only a day or two that you’ve lost sleep because of the young master. Same with constantly thinking only about him. It’s normal. It’s just your normal, Niah, daily life?”

“Whaat? No, no. It wasn’t this bad…”

Niah, who had been blushing all this time, pouted his lips and became embarrassed. It was news to him that the fact he thought about the young master all day long was so obvious on the outside. He had talked to Harriet a lot about the young master, but they had also talked about many other topics. He had heard about her younger siblings, and about the mansion where she used to work and her hometown. But to think she already knew his worries before he even said anything was so embarrassing.

“Has it gotten a bit worse, maybe? You were always good at your work. More than anything, losing your appetite is definitely a big deal.”

Harriet giggled teasingly and rubbed the back of his head. Niah quietly accepted her touch but grumbled that it wasn’t true. At that, Harriet asked in an even more mischievous tone.

“But what part of that is perverted?”

“What?”

“No matter how I think about it, it doesn’t seem perverted.”

Niah flared up, turning bright red. Her interest piqued by his intense reaction, Harriet gently coaxed him to open his mouth. She promised she wouldn’t tease him about five times, persuaded him about ten times, and encouraged him about fifteen times before she could hear his real concern.

“Th-that is… The thinking about him constantly, that’s the same… But, like, like…”

“Like?”

Niah unclasped his hands and wiggled his fingers. His steps slowed due to his hesitation. His lips only opened and closed, moving silently. He glanced at Harriet, then took a deep breath and hunched his shoulders tightly. The voice, as if squeezed out, hesitantly trickled out, growing smaller and smaller.

“Like, I keep, wanting to take the young master’s clothes off…”

Harriet, who had stopped in her tracks, mulled over Niah’s answer. Then, pfft, a suppressed laugh burst out and turned into peals of laughter, making a loud noise. She laughed so hard she even bent backward. Because of this, the quiet corridor rang loudly with echoes. Niah felt like he was being teased two, three times over. His resentful face contorted as if tears were about to drop at any moment.

“You said you wouldn’t! You said you wouldn’t tease me!”

“Sorry, sorry. I won’t laugh, pffft, I won’t laugh.”

“…”

“Really. I really won’t laugh anymore. See, I’m not laughing, am I?”

Harriet struggled to smooth down the corners of her mouth that were trying to rise and apologized again. She even cleared her throat to hold back the giggles that were trying to escape. Her stomach hurt from laughing so much. Niah was a little resentful of her but quietly nodded. He wasn’t the type to blame her for long. The two, who had stopped for a while, started walking forward again. They had a set morning routine, so they didn’t have much time to delay. This was especially true for Harriet.

“Anyway, that’s something to worry about.”

“Right? What do I do now, Harriet…”

“What if you just ask him to show you? No, wait. But don’t you see him every day? When he’s bathing or changing clothes?”

“What? Well, that’s, true… But it’s embarrassing to look closely. And I could get caught. The young master knows everything like that…”

“Aha… You want to see the young master naked without getting caught?”

“Harrieeet!”

Although no proper solution emerged by the time they reached the still room, Niah felt much more at ease. It was much better than when he was agonizing over it alone. On top of that, he also received a plate of candied flowers, so his slight resentment all melted away. The thought of sharing them with the young master actually made him feel good. Harriet gently patted Niah, who was happy over something so trivial. Then, after hesitating for a moment, she began to speak.

“You know, Niah. Just do what your heart tells you to do. I don’t think the young master would dislike it either, right? If he disliked it, he would have kicked you out a long time ago. And last time, you were too scared to go because you were afraid of being scolded, but you ended up going, didn’t you? Nothing happened then, right? Far from being scolded, you see him every day and are with him every day now. Aren’t you? So do what you want to do. In my opinion, that’s the answer you’re looking for.”

“But, Harriet…”

“Instead, don’t just go up to him and say, ‘Young Master, please take off your clothes.’ Okay? You can’t just start undressing him, you hear?”

Niah huffed at her teasing tone and headed toward the central area. In the middle of his walk, he turned back and diligently waved his hand in greeting. Harriet waited until Niah had completely disappeared from sight before opening the door to the still room.

She felt quite amused by the unexpected love counseling. The honest desire of a greenhorn who seemed to have never liked anyone before was both cute and funny. At this point, she even wanted to hear the young master’s side of the story. She had a hunch that if Niah was in this state, the young master would be even more so, not less.

Harriet 괜히 covered her mouth and giggled. It was because she had a gut feeling that Orca, too, probably had no experience with romance. Wherever he went, he would have been followed by terrifying rumors, and she wondered how many people would readily fall in love with him knowing all that. The thought that it would be a huge mess if both of them were greenhorns made her happy once again.

Of course, there were many things that weighed on her heart for her to just find it amusing, but it seemed better to leave those matters to the young master. It didn’t seem polite to Niah, or to the young master, for her to step in and talk about the engagement this and that, or how the young master was someone who would be leaving soon. Harriet just planned to fulfill her duties as a matchmaker and listen well to the outlandish worries Niah would occasionally lay out.

I wonder if he’ll come to me saying he wants to kiss him next.

She burst out laughing, “Ahaha.”

The dim dressing room occasionally rustled—rustle. Niah was sitting dazedly on the vanity, which had become his designated spot. Orca was caught at the end of his fixed gaze. He couldn’t take his eyes off him, as if he were a great spectacle. He fumbled on the vanity and popped the flower blossom Harriet had given him into his mouth. The dry petals crumbled like the cheers of spectators surrounding a jester. The quiet surroundings were filled only with the sound of crunch, crunch.

Orca, who had roughly rubbed his wet hair dry, put on his pajama top. It was a method he had devised for the goldfish who would act restless outside the dressing room whenever he changed clothes.

He would always get fully dressed except for the top, then call Niah inside. Niah, who would be busily peeking in, would rush in and run to the vanity, and Orca would grab him near his hips, lift him up, and set him down. Then he would entrust his not-yet-dry hair to him and ask him to fasten the buttons or cuff links. Niah firmly believed that he was attending to his clothes.

Attending to his bath was a similar situation. All he did was fill the bathtub with water, dissolve a bath bomb, sit quietly next to it, and scrub Orca’s forearms or shoulder blades a few times with a brush. He dedicated more than half of that time to admiring Orca. On top of that, every other day, Niah was also put into the bathtub. Especially when it was late at night, because of Orca who insisted on having him wash in his room, one of the two pairs of pajamas he had brought with him was already down on the fourth floor.

If others had seen this behavior in detail, they would have clicked their tongues, asking who was the servant and who was the master, but Niah himself considered himself a pretty helpful servant. The treatment he received had long crossed the boundary of a servant, yet he struggled on his own, wanting to serve Orca well. Since he was actually trying his best to do everything with all his might, it was a plausible assessment.

Orca, with a towel thrown over the top of his head, walked towards the persistent eyes that seemed to be licking him up. As the distance gradually closed, Niah, who was sucking on his sugar-stained fingers, stretched out his arms. His gaze, which had been sweeping over Orca’s contoured stomach or chest, now swept across his face. Orca, standing in front of Niah, naturally bent his back to lower his posture. His two hands, spread as if trapping prey, rested on the edge of the vanity.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

“I wasn’t, no I was, I was just looking…”

Niah, who had been staring intently only at his lips, snapped his eyes upward. Flustered, his words came out jumbled. When Orca’s eyes narrowed, he feigned innocence for no reason. With the most casual expression possible, he moved his hands diligently. Afraid that he would be more suspicious if his face turned red, he deliberately tried to think of miscellaneous things.

He thought about going to the vegetable patch during the day to trim the tomato stems, the tangy taste of the new tea food he had during afternoon teatime, and how the young master had helped him when he almost dropped the water bottle earlier, but he soon erased them all. Then he regretted doing something so pointless. It was because no matter what he thought of, Orca followed along with it.

Orca snatched the wrist that was flapping like a freshly caught stingray. The other hand, which had stopped along with it, also fell away from the towel. Niah wanted to rip his own heart out. He resented it for making such a loud pounding noise—thump-thump—without its owner’s permission. Knowing that his young master could hear it better than he could, his shoulders naturally hunched. He tried to search for an excuse, but any clumsy excuse was cut off before it could even come out.

Orca brought his face so close they were almost touching and pressed him for an answer. Niah lowered his gaze and turned his head slightly. His eyelashes trembled with tension. He clutched his clothes without realizing it.

“Your gaze was impure.”

“No. It wasn’t.”

“You looked at me like that all day.”

“No, it’s not true… I wasn’t thinking about anything…”

Instead of letting go of his wrist, Orca rubbed his lips with his hand. He had corrected his habit of chewing on them whenever he was in trouble, so now they were always smooth. Even when he was about to chew, he would hesitate and fidget. It was worth applying medicine whenever he had the chance.

“You were, thinking.”

Niah prayed to be allowed to faint right then and there. He felt like his perverted worries had been completely found out. It felt like all his inner thoughts had been taken out and put on display. He was about to stubbornly insist that it wasn’t true, but gave up. There was no way he could deceive the young master. It was certain, seeing as he didn’t believe him even after he said no twice.

He wondered if he would be scolded less if he were honest and was about to open his mouth to say something, but he held it back. It would be a much bigger problem if he were completely labeled a pervert. He might even be really kicked out. Harriet had said that doing what he wanted would be the answer, but it wasn’t as easy as she said. Only sighs piled up one after another.

While Niah was lost and wandering, Orca pushed his finger in as he pleased. The thumb that had been rubbing his lower lip this way and that sank into the soft flesh as if buried. Prying between his closed teeth, it lightly tapped the tip of his tongue. He disliked the way the tongue, startled, hid inward. He inserted his finger deeper and chased after the escaped tongue. The heat of the breathless pants that poured out between his teeth was sensual.

Niah, who had been quietly being tormented as usual, suddenly felt wronged. The young master always touched him as he pleased, but it was unfair that he was the only one who couldn’t. The moment the thought that it was unfair occurred to him, he felt more and more wronged. He was so wronged he was on the verge of being indignant.

Niah, who had been fuming inwardly, bit down hard on the finger that was stirring inside his mouth. The expression “held on” suited it better than “bit.” In any case, Orca stopped the torment as Niah wanted.

“I want to do it too.”

After looking around cautiously for a good while, Niah’s demand after spitting out the finger was out of the blue. He had gone and done exactly what Harriet had told him not to do. Fortunately, it wasnwasn’t quite “Young Master, please take off your clothes,” but it was just as difficult. However, it was hard to suppress the sense of unfairness that had once burst out. Even as he hunched his stiffly rigid body and stammered, he said what he had to say.

“I, I want to touch too. It’s always just you, Young Master… like this, it’s unfair.”

“What is.”

The more Niah shrank, the closer Orca pressed in, questioning him. He had long since grown accustomed to the disjointed words that would pop out randomly whenever Niah was even slightly flustered. However, even though he understood, he pretended not to and continued to press the matter.

The goldfish, easily cornered, invariably gave a raw answer. Flushed bright red, he said whatever came to his mind as it was. It was enjoyable to see that naive reaction. The goldfish was ridiculously honest. He didn’t know how to beat around the bush.