I was very flustered. Unlike his indifferent reaction after asking about my height, his questions about my art were genuine. I never expected that he, who was indifferent to the point of being hostile towards me, would be curious about my art.
“No… I don’t have any…”
“Don’t you have pictures or anything?”
I shook my head.
I shook my head several times, gripping the water glass in front of me tightly.
Between his breaths as he smoked, the faint vibration of his phone, woong woong woong, seeped in. The one he had placed on the table was still. He flicked his ashes and gestured with his chin.
“Answer it. It’s okay.”
The caller was Hyung Inwoo.
He said he had dropped off Noona Yuni and Hyung Juhan and had just arrived home, asking if I got home safe. I thanked Hyung, who said he had a good time today, once again for the meal and hung up. It was less than a minute.
“Did you two develop into a relationship that quickly?”
He said, putting out the cigarette that had burned down to the filter in the ashtray. There was no sarcastic tone.
“No… Not really, not like that… We just exchanged numbers earlier today…”
“So even though he’s gay, it seems Seo Yeehyeon isn’t completely uninterested in Choi Inwoo?”
Since the declaration that he was gay was false, or at least an unverified, impulsive statement, I didn’t know how to respond.
He fiddled with the ion drink bottle, opened the cap, and took another sip.
“You don’t have much dating experience, do you?”
“……”
It was fortunate that he didn’t bring up the art again, but dating wasn’t a comfortable topic either.
He crossed his legs and leaned back against the backrest, sitting loosely, tapping the table with the bottle as he looked at me from across. From what I had observed so far, he wasn’t one for good posture.
“Choi Inwoo isn’t a bad guy as a friend, but I can’t say he’s a good guy as a man.”
Did he have enough interest in me to worry about me getting hurt by a bad guy? Thinking that, I blankly stared at his eyes, which were still fascinating to me, who was used to black eyes.
Perhaps he took my lack of a clear reaction as a sign that I didn’t realize the seriousness of the situation, he leaned his upper body forward and made a more serious expression.
“Someone like Seo Yeehyeon, who’s a novice, can’t handle his level. From what I can see, you seem to value getting to know each other slowly and connecting… He’s far from that kind of relationship.”
“What about you, CEO?”
“……”
He frowned as if he didn’t expect me to say anything, even though he was talking to me face-to-face.
Whether it was the alcohol or the ‘wriggling’ that I had been showing lately, which allowed me to be somewhat mischievous with him, I was asking a question that I myself thought was bold.
“Then are you a good guy as a man, CEO?”
He looked down at the table and smiled. Then he lit a new cigarette. He exhaled a long stream of smoke from the first puff and said.
“Does a good man… even exist? I’ve never seen one.”
It was as if he had been badly hurt by a bad man. Or perhaps he was defining himself as the worst kind of bad guy.
But I couldn’t ask for a detailed explanation. In the very next moment, the self-deprecating smile had already disappeared from his face.
“Since you met Choi Inwoo while working at Phantom, I’m saying this because I feel something like responsibility. Don’t take everything that guy says at face value. Well… but if Seo Yeehyeon is drawn to him, there’s nothing I can say about that.”
If he was saying it in that sense, it was just something ‘like’ responsibility, as he said. He didn’t intend to actively stop it, but he wanted to put up a thin shield in advance to reduce the uneasiness that it was a tragedy caused by me if things got complicated.
As if he had said enough about that, he pushed the hair that had fallen over his forehead with the back of his left hand holding the cigarette and changed the subject.
“I’d like you to officially start working at Phantom. Recently, the number of affiliated artists has increased, and the number and scale of exhibitions have also increased, so the staff has been having a hard time. I’ve been thinking about hiring more staff, but I’m a bit… picky about people, so I’ve been making things difficult for the kids. I’d like Seo Yeehyeon to come and work. I came up here today to talk about that. I’ll have Team Leader Han relay the details.”
He said that in a quick tone, as if he would get up and leave as soon as he finished talking about this, but he continued to smoke even after he finished talking.
Perhaps because of the alcohol, my brain was working slowly.
I didn’t expect him to want to hire me as an employee. No, somewhere deep in my subconscious, I think I had been anticipating that this would eventually happen.
I don’t know what’s what. I rubbed the water droplets that had formed on the surface of the cup due to the temperature difference between the inside and outside with my finger and asked him.
“Can I ask… why you suddenly changed your mind?”
“I decided based on Seo Yeehyeon’s work ethic and results, it’s not like I changed my mind. Team Leader Han and the staff also want Seo Yeehyeon.”
“It’s not because you know I’m not an Omega…?”
My brain, which was working slower than usual, seemed to have even lost its sense of direction. I could blurt out such questions as they came to mind without much hesitation. Considering that I usually choose my words more carefully than necessary, it was a rather bold question for me.
Is he suddenly making this offer because he thinks there’s little chance of me causing problems since I’m not an Omega? Then why did his ability to distinguish Omegas so accurately malfunction when it came to me in the first place?
He was silent for a moment at my question, which could sound cheeky depending on the perspective, and then he inhaled the cigarette two or three times in quick succession.
“About that, are you really not an Omega?”
Perhaps because of the light shining down on me from above and the cigarette in his fingers, I felt like I was being interrogated by a detective.
“Yes, I received a 100% confirmed Beta diagnosis in the examination in middle school and in the physical examination before enlistment.”
“Then what is it?”
Then what is it? He muttered to himself as if asking himself, but his gaze was still fixed on me, as if he still couldn’t accept the fact that I was a Beta, or rather, that I wasn’t an Omega.
“I told you I’m a Beta.”
“Are you really a Beta? Unless you’re a Golden Omega or have some money in your family, honestly, the world isn’t a favorable place to live as an Omega. There are many opportunities to be exposed to danger. So if you’re pretending to be a Beta… you don’t have to.”
The wind was blowing from the open kitchen window. A strange scent that seemed to be his perfume was mixed in with the cigarette smoke that spread with the wind.
He didn’t even realize that the embers at the end of the cigarette were burning down to the filter, and he didn’t even think about putting out the cigarette and stared at me. It was as if he wanted me to make a false confession that I was actually an Omega.
His gray-blue eyes slowly looked back and forth between my left and right eyes under his narrowly opened eyelids.
Perhaps because of the alcohol, my body kept drooping. No, it was a little different from drooping. It was true that I felt limp, as if the joints in my whole body had loosened, but in that state, I felt like I was floating in the air.
I felt like I wanted to lie down right away because I was so languid, and I also felt like I wanted to take out more alcohol and drink because I felt so uplifted. I’m definitely not in a normal state right now.
I drank some water to clear my head, bit my lower lip once, and opened my mouth. I wanted him to give up on this issue now.
“No, I’m a Beta. Even if I were an Omega… I wouldn’t hide it for the reasons you mentioned.”
After that, he didn’t take his eyes off me for a while. It was getting harder and harder to sit down as my body floated on the waves.
Finally, he put out the cigarette and the acrid smoke disappeared, the influence of the perfume became stronger. It was such a strong scent that it was strange that I hadn’t noticed it while being so close in the bar and in the back seat of the car.
Fragrant, or unpleasant.
It was a complex, formula-like scent that was difficult to divide into such simple preferences.
If I smelled this scent on someone while walking down the street, I would probably turn around and look again because of the uniqueness of the scent. A scent that strangely touched my nerves and pulled me in.
“Ha… what am I…”
He said that, shaking his head as if blaming himself. I couldn’t tell what he was blaming himself for.
He put out the cigarette, took the half-drunk ion drink, and got up from his seat. If I had any questions about the issue of working full-time, I should consult with Team Leader Han, and as I knew, he would help me faithfully. With those business-like words, he disappeared beyond the front door.
Perhaps because of the alcohol, I felt a strong surge of sexual desire. It was natural for me to feel sexual desire several times a day at my age, but it was extremely rare for me, who lived as if all desires had been castrated.
I stopped showering and stroked my genitals under the stream of water. It wasn’t the usual mechanical masturbation where I simply erected and reached climax through friction and pressure.
In the overwhelming sexual pleasure that made the skin of my entire body tingle, I couldn’t support my trembling legs and had to lean against the tiled wall as if collapsing. I felt fear at the intense surge of desire that I was feeling for the first time, a desire that transcended both my personality and experience and swallowed me whole.
I was unfamiliar with myself, who was moaning incoherently and clutching my genitals that wouldn’t subside even after one ejaculation, not knowing what to do.
Excessive drinking is not only bad for your health, but it also carries a high risk of exposure to sudden sexual desire.
Even though it was a more intense act than ever before, when I collapsed on the bed in exhaustion, I felt more thirsty than relieved. I twisted the sheets, lightly slammed them down, and cursed out loud for the first time in years.
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