“Have you always been out in the garden shirtless like this?”
I laid my hand over his as it stroked my shoulder and upper arm, and nodded.
“From now on, give me a heads-up. It’s such a shame I’ve been missing out on something this good.”
He kissed the curve of my shoulder where my neck met my arm, then came to stand beside me, gently massaging the back of my neck.
“The sunglasses look good on you. Then again, what wouldn’t?”
I smiled back at him as he tapped his own cheekbone, and changed the direction of the hose from the daphne to the spirea. The arc of the rainbow in the stream of water, which now reached farther, grew larger as well. The sound of the water hitting the spirea was a little different from the daphne.
“Um… I’m thinking of going to the hospital.”
“……”
His hand, which had been lightly kneading my neck and shoulder, slowly came to a stop.
“I thought it was just mild gastritis or maybe I was just sensitive to the heat, so I figured it would pass… but you seem so worried, and honestly, the symptoms aren’t showing any signs of getting better… so I’m thinking of getting it checked out. It’s probably nothing, but it feels foolish to just endure it when there’s no improvement.”
No one had ever worried this much about me for something as trivial as having little appetite or feeling slightly nauseous at the smell of food. And since I myself wasn’t one to particularly enjoy eating, I had never taken a loss of appetite seriously. This time, too, my first instinct had been to ignore it, assuming it would pass as it always did.
But the attentive man had noticed my symptoms even without me saying a word. And for me to neglect my own body, which someone else cherished so dearly… it felt disrespectful to the one who treasured it.
Besides, though it hadn’t quite sunk in yet, I also had the thought that if I was going to continue working steadily as a full-time artist, maintaining a certain level of stamina and health had to be accepted as part of my self-care.
“I’ll take some time next week during the day… to go… get it checked out.”
When he remained silent for a long while, I turned to find him lost in thought, his hand still on my shoulder. His profile, so still he seemed to have forgotten to blink, looked even more like a sculpture. It was elegant and delicate, as if tinged with ivory, but the coarse, wild nature that shone through that thin layer drew out an irresistible tension and sexiness.
To express the wildness behind the elegance, or the elegance enshrouding the wildness, was impossible with ordinary skill. He was like a masterpiece born from the fingertips of a master. At least, that was how he looked to me.
Perhaps sensing my admiring gaze, or perhaps having finished his train of thought, he flinched with self-awareness and turned his head toward me.
“Yes… that’s a good idea. If you’re not feeling well, you should see a doctor. I’ll make an appointment for you with Choi In-woo.”
I hadn’t expected him to tell me to go see In-woo, and my eyes widened in spite of myself.
“He may seem like that, but he’s very thorough with his examinations.”
He smiled briefly, without showing his teeth. Then, his expression suddenly turned serious and he turned his body toward me, taking another step closer. His large shadow cast a shade over half of my face.
Even though he had emerged from his thoughts, his expression remained as it was when he was lost in his own world, as if suspended outside of time. But it wasn’t that he wasn’t looking at me. It might sound grandiose, but his face was one of longing, as if he wanted to pull me into his world and trap me there.
He lowered his head and buried his lips in my shoulder. The head of the water gun trembled as his hands slid down from my shoulders to caress both sides of my waist. My other thoughts trembled and scattered along with it. Hah… a sigh-like moan escaped me in a thin stream.
His hands fumbled from my sides to my back, wrapping strongly around my waist. His lips traveled up from my shoulder to my nape and slid along my jawline. I closed my eyes in anticipation and parted my lips.
“Ugh, mm. Mmm.”
I dropped the water gun at the deep, immediate kiss. The hose, which had been thrashing and twisting like a long eel on dry land, soon quieted, laying its head peacefully on the grass and letting the water flow.
I wanted to remember everything—about the heat of August, about every step of his kiss that painted new, previously unknown sensations on my lips and tongue, about the sweet, sour, hot… and sometimes startlingly unfamiliar taste of a summer day where my first feelings for another person were cautiously ripening. About the first infatuation that is said to become the benchmark for all subsequent relationships in a person’s history, and about the object of that forever unforgettable infatuation, Liu Weikun.
○
The operational status report meeting was one of the duties he most wanted to avoid. A small to mid-sized general hospital with about 150 beds rarely had incidents that could create major variables in its operations. It had been promoted to a general hospital about ten years ago after meeting the minimum qualifications, but the obstetrics and gynecology department, which had been building trust since his maternal great-grandfather’s time, was still the hospital’s main source of income.
Although it was equipped with operating rooms, an emergency room, and even a funeral hall, it never had patients who required life-or-death surgeries, and the hospital’s own policy was to transfer any uncertain cases to a larger hospital, so it operated stably without any tricky problems arising.
While not as fierce as in large general hospitals, there were some political factions within the hospital, but as the son of the director and vice-director, he was able to keep a moderate distance from it all.
His parents, who would ask for nothing more if their troublesome second son would just behave, had hired him after accepting all his demands—that he would absolutely not work more than 35 hours a week, and that he would not take on any life-or-death surgeries.
Becoming a doctor in the first place had been against his will. He and his parents had reached a compromise of sorts: he would be satisfied with having an office in the family hospital, where all his other siblings also held positions, and showing up for work with the title of internal medicine specialist.
Minimum responsibility and maximum freedom. It was the life he himself had wanted, and he had no complaints, but after turning thirty, he had started to feel that something was missing. The absence of complaints did not mean satisfaction, and he had enough of an education to occasionally feel a sense of responsibility to himself for things like what it means to be human or the meaning of a finite life. Whether he wanted it or not.
Right after the meeting, as soon as talk of a golf tour to Chiang Mai, Thailand, came up among the department heads, he bolted, using a prior engagement as an excuse to leave first.
He felt he needed to get out of his gown quickly and find a partner for the night, for the first time in a while. His frustration wasn’t strictly sexual, but he felt he had to resolve what could be resolved, at least for now.
“Doctor, you have a visitor waiting inside.”
A nurse from the internal medicine desk across from his office called out and stopped him urgently. He paused his steps, his hand just about to reach for the doorknob.
“A visitor?”
“Um… your friend who runs the gallery.”
“Him?”
He raised his voice and scrunched up his face as if he’d been told an enemy had come to visit. The nurse’s expression darkened at his reaction.
“I was sure he was your friend, so I told him to wait… Did I do something wrong?”
He held up a file folder and shook his head.
“Ah, no. Not at all. I have an idea what this is about. Please just process me as having left for the day. Don’t mind me and carry on with your work.”
His expression, now lighter and tinged with curiosity, was a stark contrast to before as he entered his office. A large presence, unsuited for the cozy, seven-pyeong office, stood with its back to the window.
“Anyone would think this is your room.”
“……”
The tall man, clad in a navy Italian linen suit that emphasized his broad shoulders and relatively slim waistline, stood with his hands thrust into his trouser pockets, not moving a muscle.
“What’s so urgent that you chased me all the way to the hospital? Huh? Weren’t you supposed to be head over heels in newlywed bliss?”
He tossed the file onto his desk and smirked at the man’s back as he took off his gown.
The man had stopped by briefly a couple of times when they were together outside, but this was the first time he had ever come to the hospital just to see him. Come to think of it, he was about to think it was amazing that the nurse had remembered the man was his acquaintance after seeing him only twice, but in truth, his was a face hard to forget even after a fleeting glimpse.
In any case, the corners of his mouth kept twitching with amusement as he wondered what could have made this stoic man so desperate that he had to bypass the usual procedure of contacting him to make an appointment.
“What, react when I poke you.”
After he hung his gown in the cabinet built into one of the walls, the back that had remained rooted to the spot finally spoke.
“Have you ever…”
“……”
“As an Alpha, been bound to a single Omega?”
“What?”
“I suppose not. You’ve likely never been in a continuous relationship with one Omega.”
The man’s voice wasn’t blaming him. It was just dry, like someone searching for hope in a hopeless place. This was not the direction he had expected the man’s urgent visit to take.
“What are you talking about? Is this the main point, the introduction, or what?”
He crossed his arms and leaned a shoulder against the cabinet, narrowing his eyes with a frown. The man kept his gaze stubbornly fixed on the unremarkable scenery outside the window, as if there were anything to appreciate.
“An experience where the other’s pheromones overwhelmingly take precedence over your judgment, your choices, your will… where no matter how much you struggle, you can’t be yourself, but exist and function only as that Omega’s Alpha… you’ve never been exposed to something like that… have you.”
As soon as the man finished speaking, he scowled fiercely, strode over, and grabbed his firm shoulder.
“Are you tired of Yeehyeon already?”
The face of the man who turned to him wore an expression he didn’t recognize, but he had no desire to take that into consideration.
“Weren’t you serious? I thought all that talk about danger was just a good excuse, that you were so smitten you wanted to seat him in your house and dote on him… Is the great Liu Weikun really sitting here talking about pheromones because he’s been hooked by an Omega? You crazy…”
The man’s eyes, looking at him, twisted with contempt. The contorted lips extinguished his excitement.
“I’m talking about Seo Yeehyeon .”
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