Hyung and Morae, their hands clasped tightly, walked through the lobby and into the coffee shop. It wasn't a sight you saw often. Hyung's face was stiff, his eyes sweeping their surroundings, but Morae spotted me right away, waved, and came over exactly as she always did.

"Nice spot you found, Seo Ihyeon."

She dropped onto the sofa across from me—I was seated by the window, a grand piano at my back—and carried on about how lucky we were to get a window seat, as if she'd come here to enjoy her afternoon.

The lobby coffee shop of a five-star hotel on Namsan. She had chosen this meeting place herself.

Through the floor-to-ceiling windows, which had to span at least three stories, the hazy gray city spread below, rain still drifting across it. Beyond the Han River everything was blurred and washed out by the downpour and the mist it made, but on a clear day you could probably see far into the distance.

"Your Director isn't running a private detective agency on the side, is he? Or maybe he has some experience going on the run himself."

Once the staff member who had taken our order left, Morae leaned her arms on the table, tilted her upper body forward, and asked with a playful lilt. Her usual tone made me wonder if I'd somehow misread why we were meeting.

Around noon, he had called to say it would be best if hyung and nuna moved out of their place immediately—he had a temporary residence ready. He'd also suggested holding the meeting with my uncle there, since the security was tight. He added that if the two of them were mentally prepared, he could have everything arranged for them to leave Seoul tomorrow, or even tonight.

I had been sunk in a sleep that felt like death, and with my mind still dulled, I couldn't keep up with his pace. I'd expected his work to be efficient rather than slow or clumsy, but I couldn't help being surprised by how much faster and more meticulous he was than I'd imagined.

As soon as I finished the call, I got out of bed and phoned nuna. I told her everything—the reason I had disappeared so abruptly the night before, the matter of the deposit, the plan he had prepared. It ended up being a full hour.

After listening to all of it and filling in the gaps with a few questions, Morae said she couldn't trust him. Not right now, not yet.

I found myself agreeing, at least partly. It wasn't that he seemed suspicious—it was that right now, in this situation, she couldn't bring herself to trust just anyone easily. To me, he was someone I could trust. To her, he was a man she had never even seen. And she was also, by nature, a very cautious person.

For the time being, Morae and Yeehan put all of his suggestions on hold, quickly moved their things to the owner's place from "What Happened in Bali," and set this coffee shop as the meeting spot. Everything else would be decided after speaking with my uncle.

"He's probably... not, I don't think."

I shook my head, trying to picture him dressed like the head of the detective agency Morae nuna, Yeehan hyung and I had once visited—dealing with a client on the fourth floor of some rundown building without an elevator, asking for evidence of a spouse's affair.

"I only thought maybe he'd gotten help from a professional. The escape plan was so meticulous."

Morae had been leaning sideways against the table, sipping her water as she said that, but then she set her glass down abruptly and leaned toward me. Her eyes widened a little.

"Wait—what happened to your lip?"

I flinched before I could stop myself and pulled back.

"Oh, I ate ramen before bed... Is it that swollen?"

I instinctively touched my lower lip as if to hide it while asking back. I was surprised at how calmly I deflected. Even the part where I asked if it was really that swollen felt unfamiliar—it was a fairly practiced response for me, but cold sweat was already gathering on my back.

"Your lower lip's a bit... like that. I thought something had bitten you. You don't swell up easily. What happened?"

As if brushing off her own curiosity, Morae leaned back into the sofa, tilted her glass, and dropped an ice cube into her mouth.

The moment Morae's back touched the sofa, hyung suddenly jumped to his feet—and my attention, which had been fixed on my lip, scattered at once. Morae and I both turned to follow his gaze.

Crunch. The sound of Morae biting down on the ice was unusually vivid. Her eyes had cooled, arming themselves with the easy nonchalance she always wore.

A thin khaki summer jacket with a collar, hiking pants, sneakers, and a worn baseball cap, its brim bleached white along the edge. My uncle had appeared in the coffee shop of a five-star hotel looking suspicious to anyone who saw him.

I thought how easily a person could cross from ordinary, decent citizen to someone suspect. At the fishermen's co-op auction back in the village, my uncle had blended in like he was wearing camouflage—a plain, unremarkable fisherman among the crowd. Here, he had become a suspicious figure, receiving wary glances from the hotel staff and curious sidelong looks from certain guests.

A tall, polished middle-aged man who looked roughly my uncle's age was striding briskly across the hall, deep in conversation with a foreign man in a suit. As he passed, he glanced sideways at my uncle. For some reason I couldn't watch it, and I looked away.

"I'm sorry for asking you to come somewhere like this. It must be uncomfortable."

"No."

Morae had stood to wait for my uncle to approach, and now guided him respectfully to the seat beside me.

"It's not that we don't trust you, uncle—it's that we don't trust my father. We thought he might be planning to use you as bait to bring us in. That's why we wanted to meet here. He's exactly the kind of person who would do that. As you know."

My uncle nodded as if he understood, picked up my water glass, and drained it in one go until only ice was left.

Iced coffees were served for Yeehan and Morae, and when the staff asked if he'd like to order, my uncle answered simply, "Coffee." His rough, thick hands kept clenching and unclenching on his thighs, the side of his face rigid with tension.

The situation I had briefly outlined over the phone was laid out again through Morae, as if to confirm it. When she asked calmly whether this was indeed how things stood, my uncle nodded. Morae let out a heavy sigh and added a sincere apology.

He showed no reaction to the apology. After a long silence, he opened his mouth with a tired face.

"So... what are you planning to do now?"

"About what?"

Yeehan started to push forward, his voice thick, but Morae grabbed his hand and held it firmly.

"We're going to stay together. Until we ourselves decide we no longer want to be."

From under the deep brim of his cap, my uncle watched them both in silence for a moment. Then he let out a low, wounded groan—the sound of something carrying far more than words—and looked away.

A group of four or five elegant middle-aged women passed by us, exchanging cheerful pleasantries on their way out. When the surrounding noise died down and only Schumann's piano trio remained, low in the background, my uncle spoke again, heavier than before.

"If I were to... kneel here and beg you... is there truly no way you'd come back?"

"......"

Everyone at the table went silent.

Hyung's face was the first to twist, flushing dark red, as if he had just been asked something deeply insulting. Then his eyes began to burn.

"Who's asking to watch Father kneel? Does this look like we're trying to hurt someone and win? If you kneel, do you think I'll be happy about it—like this is what I wanted, and cheerfully fall in line?"

I understood what was upsetting hyung. I also understood that this anger wasn't aimed at my uncle. Morae nuna and Yeehan hyung hadn't divided the people in this situation into victims and perpetrators. They believed their choices were justified, and at the same time they were suffering under guilt toward their parents.

If this were on a boat, at the port, in the cement-paved yard of my grandfather's house, my uncle would have struck hyung without hesitation with that heavy palm of his. But here, even in the face of hyung's raised voice and defiance, he only lowered his head deeper, like a condemned man.

Seeing that, hyung clenched his fist and turned away. Morae remained still, as if preserved in place—her face empty of any detectable anger or sorrow—staring down at the ice melting in the glass on the table, lost in thought.

Because he had only said "coffee," my uncle's coffee had been served hot. But it probably wouldn't have mattered what kind it was. As if unable to feel the heat or the taste, he lifted the cup—which looked impossibly small against his thick hands and fingers—took a sip of the hot coffee, set it down, and spoke.

"I'm an uneducated man, so I don't understand the things you talk about—freedom of choice, the self, all of that. Honestly, I do think this is just youthful passion, emotions running hot, a kind of childish game. I understand how you feel right now, like you'll die if you're apart, like you can't live without each other... I'm not entirely unaware of how you kids feel."

While listening to my uncle speak, I had to clench my own hands on my lap. His words made me more anxious than back when he used to simply shout without trying to listen. Empathy is more effective at persuading people than coercion or pressure—and the two of them were already struggling under guilt as it was.

Unaware of my quickening breath, my uncle continued.

"But having lived this long... I've learned that even a flame that feels like it will last forever eventually dies out. Hani—and you, Morae—for your parents at least... is there truly no way you can endure the pain for now and let go?"

I nearly flew out of my seat as I grabbed my uncle's forearm.

"If you separate those two, don't you know what will happen? Can't you see it from what happened to my father?"

It wasn't like me, and it wasn't my place—I was nothing more than a third party. But I couldn't stand by and watch, wondering if the two of them might waver in front of their parents showing weakness.

My uncle's yellowish eyes, the borders of his irises murky and opaque, turned toward me. They seemed to say both how could I not know that and Morae and Yeehan are different from your father.

But I knew. Having spent more than five years by their side, I understood them far better than my uncle—far better than Mr. Lim.

I could have used his exact words from the night before.

Hyung and nuna weren't simply a couple romantically drawn to each other. They were a set that could only be complete together, and the tragedy that occurred when such people were unnaturally torn apart was my father—and the ruined work that tragedy had created was the person standing here now. I couldn't allow that to happen again.

Morae, who had been staring at a fixed point on the table, opened her mouth in a voice stripped of all emotion, dry and tight.

"As you say—we won't die without Seo Yeehan."

"......"

My anxious gaze shifted naturally toward Morae nuna. The grip on my uncle's arm loosened.

"That I'm being unfilial, driving nails into my parents' hearts and my brothers' hearts just to stay with Hani. How could I not know that? I will carry that guilt for the rest of my life."

I had been making foolish worries. If she had been prepared to waver at this point, she never would have left the village in the first place.

"'My life is my own,' 'children are not their parents' property'—to parents, there is probably no more wicked thing to hear. But we are not making this choice out of pleasure in hurting or betraying them... We are living with just as much pain and guilt as the sense of betrayal and worry they must be feeling right now."

After adding that this was not a request for understanding, Morae fell briefly silent. In that pause, her face looked like that of someone who had lived through a very long time. It wasn't that she looked older—she looked like someone who had stepped past all the trivial, suffocating anxieties that drive us into life's traps and drifted slightly outside of time. It might sound like an exaggeration, but I had felt this from her before, not just now.

Even while committing what the world calls filial impiety, she did not want to blame or resent anyone for her life or her choices. To become the true master of one's own life, one must not only claim the freedom of choice but also bear the full weight of its consequences—that was a truth many people, myself included, looked away from. Nuna and hyung were perhaps fighting not against Mr. Lim, not against my uncle or grandfather or the world, but against their own lives.

"As you say, every fire eventually dies out. But it doesn't matter. I don't know if you'll understand this—but Hani and I were never drawn to each other just because of that burning flame, that feeling called romance."

Watching her keep a careful distance between herself and her emotions, delivering her story to him as simple fact, I saw a reflection of him from the night before.

I didn't want to dismiss their detached attitude toward life as merely an inherent Alpha trait. I didn't want to reduce their loneliness, their conflict, their effort to something meaningless that way. Yuni nuna and Juhan hyung were Betas, and yet they hadn't simply stood by while external interference reshaped them into versions of themselves they didn't want to be. In the face of the suffering that life demands in exchange for the strength to live without deceiving yourself, the distinction between Alpha and Beta becomes meaningless.

Unconsciously, I clutched at my chest with the hand I had rested weakly on my uncle's arm. Morae glanced over at me with brief concern, then took a few sips of her coffee—which had grown in volume as the ice melted—and spoke in a firm voice.

"First, I'm going to clear the debt you owe my father."

She had decided to accept the proposal I brought from him.

At the word debt, my uncle's gaze wavered with confusion. His eyes were asking: How?

"Once that's paid, he'll at least lose his pretext for blackmailing you—on the surface, at least. It's best to resolve that first. We'll send you the money."

She didn't explain the source to my uncle. She'd decided that how much to say about the money was my choice to make.

"Of course, even after that, he'll find all kinds of petty ways to make things difficult. He's my father, and I love him... but that's the kind of person he is...."

Morae paused briefly, and this time her gaze turned toward the window. For the first time, a cascade of emotions moved across her face as she thought of her father—whom she loved more than anyone because he was her father, but for whom, if you removed the bond of blood, there was so little solid ground left for love or respect. The emotions rose and vanished in quick succession.

When she slowly turned her gaze back to the table, her face had returned to its earlier state—no emotional openings, no visible vulnerability. Yet it didn't seem unfeeling. Instead, a pain radiated from her, like someone holding a mouthful of something intensely bitter.

With an expression that looked completely steady on the surface, hollow of feeling, she said:

"When you truly feel it can't go on like this anymore, please tell my father. Tell him that his monstrous daughter, his female Alpha... is grateful he raised her. That he doesn't need to live in fear anymore. That he should just... live in peace."

She slowed her words deliberately, not allowing emotion to surge, and hyung and I nearly stopped breathing. My uncle looked as if he hadn't yet understood what he had just heard.

By handing over the fact of her being an Alpha—the weakness her father had most desperately wanted to keep hidden—she was placing a weapon in my uncle's hands to use against him. That heavy secret, which had long been her burden, her shackle, and also a part of herself.

"Just saying that much... he'll understand what it means. Don't worry about what comes after."

Morae moved to pay the bill, but for the first time since sitting down, my uncle wouldn't yield. He took out an old brown wallet he didn't usually carry and produced several bills to cover all four of our drinks. After that there was almost nothing left inside.

After leaving the lobby, my uncle asked at the main entrance whether there was anywhere he could smoke. Following the doorman's directions, we circled around the right side of the building to the designated smoking area.

A wide overhang from the hotel entrance stretched above us, but the rain continued.

The long spell of rain had lowered the temperature, and despite the humidity it wasn't hot—if anything, my bare arms felt slightly cool.

The three of us watched blankly as the smoke rising from the tip of my uncle's cigarette—which looked like an extension of his body—was swallowed into the rain.

"You two have liked each other since middle school."

My uncle's eyes were drifting through the curtain of rain.

"It must have been the winter of Hani's third year of middle school... Morae, you steamed lobster at home and said it was unbelievably good, so you brought three or four over to our place around dinnertime so we could try them too. In the dead of that freezing winter. You said it was for us to try, but how could I not know you really came because you wanted Hani to eat them. That day, I was washing up at the tap when I opened the door... Your face standing at the gate holding that pot—I don't know why, but it stayed with me for a long time."

With a sharp, short breath, my uncle drew deeply on his cigarette and flicked the ash with the practiced ease of his blunt fingertips.

"I'm an ignorant man who's spent his whole life just trying to put food on the table, so I've never really lived my life sorting through things like love... but when there's something good in front of you and you want to give it to someone, and until you do you can't even swallow the finest thing yourself... I suppose that's love."

Having said the word love out loud, or perhaps simply amused that he had attempted to define it at all, my uncle shrugged his shoulders and let out a small laugh.

"Wherever you go... don't tell anyone. Not even me. If I find out, I might break under your father's threats and let something slip. Just... go, without saying a word to anyone."

He said it evenly, then exhaled the last drag of his cigarette in an unusually long breath that came out like a sigh.

"Your father too—with time, won't he forgive you someday? He's been that intense about everything involving you since you were small."

That was when Morae burst into tears.

At a timing no one had expected. In fact, none of us had ever imagined Morae nuna crying. Especially not in a situation like this—I had thought she was the kind of person who would swallow any tears by sheer will, even if they came like a storm, and never expose her naked emotions.

But Morae cried.

Like a child who suddenly trips and falls alone on flat ground without a single stone to catch on. Without any warning.

At that one sentence: he's been that intense about everything involving you since you were small—won't he forgive you someday?

She didn't just shed quiet tears. She sobbed. Yeehan pulled Morae into his arms—she had her right hand pressed over her eyes, lip caught between her teeth.

To the rest of the world, her father was the ruthless "Mr. Lim," a man who cared only about money. But he was also a father who would have laid the entire world at Morae's feet if that was what she wanted. Because he was endlessly weak when it came to her, she must have suffered even more on the way here.

The prejudice I had unknowingly held—that she wouldn't cry, that not showing tears was strength—wasn't that part of what had driven her into situations where she couldn't cry until now?

Unable to look directly at her, I stared at the ground. Then, worried that my uncle might have said something unnecessary, and seeing him completely at a loss in the face of Morae's tears, I guided him back toward the main entrance.

"I'll go with nuna and hyung. Please be careful on your way down. The money... we should be able to send it soon."

My uncle turned to look at me, one hand in his pocket, the other rubbing at his mouth.

"About that—what money do you kids even have to send something like that?"

His worried expression made the lines around his mouth look even deeper.

Honestly, the advance payment I was set to receive before I had even begun the painting felt no different from a debt—which made it hard to feel entirely comfortable. I hesitated, my lips moving slightly before I pushed out the answer like a sigh.

"I'm... painting again."

"......"

"Someone who thought highly of my old work offered me good terms to start again... It's not strange or dangerous money, so please don't worry. Just pay off the debt first."

I shook my head firmly at my uncle, who was insisting on sending me a portion every month.

My parents were the sort of people who were satisfied as long as they could keep painting while maintaining a minimal livelihood, so there had never been anything in our household you could call savings or real assets. I wasn't too young to understand that taking on my father and me in that state must have been a significant burden. And unless some major change came over my father, he would likely never leave that place. Paying off this debt gave my uncle no reason at all to feel indebted to me. If anything, I was the one who should have been apologizing.

I watched my uncle's back as he removed the plastic from the automatic umbrella dispenser and was about to open it. After a moment's hesitation, I finally spoke.

I hadn't wanted to ask—it felt like a defiance no one would even acknowledge, a pointless one. But I couldn't not ask. Something in my blood pulled at me, and a helpless surge of injustice rose up.

"How is Father...?"

"......"

My uncle turned back and simply pressed his lips together once, without a real answer. I managed a weak smile—as if to say I understood—and rubbed the back of my neck.

The reason I had revealed the source of the money was partly to reassure my uncle by framing it as payment for returning to painting. But I couldn't deny that part of me also wanted the news that I had started painting again to reach my father's ears.

Still, I didn't want to go so far as to ask him to pass on a message.

It was a solitary struggle—a desperate need to prove to my uncle, to my father, and to myself that I didn't care what my father thought of any of it.

I watched my uncle walk away under his old umbrella along the dignified red brick path where luxury sedans came and went in a steady stream, then finally looked away.

Despite rain that had been falling all day in varying degrees of intensity, many people were still visiting the hotel. Then again, for those who could step out from under a wide canopy directly into a car without ever needing to open an umbrella, the rainy season wasn't much of an obstacle to going out.

Leaning against a pillar slightly off from the main entrance, watching people come and go from the hotel, I felt my sense of reality begin to shift strangely. This was an entirely different world from the old village where my uncle had once represented the standard of ordinary.

The people here, dressed in expensive clothes and carrying themselves with a quiet, unhurried confidence, seemed like the standard of normalcy—as if most people in the world must live this way, as though everyone here shared the same refined air. Like the fishermen at the co-op auction who all resembled each other as they haggled over the saury caught at dawn.

Now that even my uncle was gone, I was the only one here—in my worn Converse and old jeans—that didn't fit.

I felt a faint, uncomfortable distance in the thought. And yet, it was somewhat absurd: I, too, had arrived here in a nice car.

"The clothes you wore yesterday have been washed and dried. I left them on the shelf across from the bathroom, so you can wear those. There's some fruit in the fridge and bread on the table, so try to eat a little before you go out."

After that I'd had to cut him off when he even started worrying about my wet shoes—saying in a voice that had nearly gone to a whisper that it was more than enough, that I was so sorry and grateful. He had taken care of my wet clothes without my asking. I'd slept soundly the whole time, and now I felt almost shameless for it.

He had also said that just to be safe, it would be better for me to use the car he had arranged for the day.

I declined, saying it didn't seem necessary to go that far, but he was firm—this wasn't kindness, he said, but precaution against danger. He didn't know what plans Morae's father might be hiding, and public transportation could be risky.

After finishing my preparations in the empty, slightly awkward house, I stepped out to the front gate and found exactly what he had described: a large black sedan waiting in the rain. An imported car bearing an emblem I recognized. A driver holding an umbrella was already standing in front of it, apparently having received his instructions in advance.

He had suggested I take Morae and Yeehan to the meeting place in that car, but Morae had refused—she suspected it might be a scheme to transfer them directly to her father the moment they were inside.

I was laughing quietly to myself at how similarly he and Morae nuna distrusted things—like siblings who'd grown up in the same environment—when Morae and Yeehan appeared from the far corner of the building. I pushed myself off the pillar I'd been leaning against.

Morae nuna had calmed down. Far from looking embarrassed or awkward about her earlier tears, she smiled at me the way she always did while holding hyung's hand, and I simply smiled back.

Everyone around them—the surf camp owner included—had always told hyung, half-jokingly and half-seriously, that he really needed to treat Morae well, that she was worth a hundred times more. And honestly, somewhere along the way I had unknowingly come to hold the same thought.

But watching the two of them today, holding each other's hands tightly in a way they usually didn't, I understood that view had only ever been a surface reading of their relationship.

I remembered what he had said last night about the relationship between an artist and a supporter—that most people assume it tips toward the artist and fails to achieve balance.

The depth of what passes only between two people like that is something no outsider can ever truly understand. What we can see is only how they behave when they're around others. Trying to define the balance of two lovers based on that alone is as reckless as judging the taste of a restaurant by the sign above the door.

On the surface it had seemed like hyung was the one who couldn't do without Morae. But watching them today, I understood the reverse was just as true. It struck me freshly.

Rudely to both of them—for the first time—I felt relieved that hyung was there beside Morae.

Morae hooked her free arm over my shoulder and said, casually:

"Is your Director someone you can trust?"

"Huh?"

I turned to look at her. With her chin tilted slightly sideways, she spoke with a somewhat awkward expression.

"My situation's like this right now. I've gotten even more suspicious than Yeehan. I'm asking whether there's any real chance he might be making deals behind our backs with my father."

I shook my head.

"He's worked with Manager Han since Hong Kong, and Manager Han trusts him a great deal... And honestly, there's nothing much he'd gain from doing something like that."

He was wealthy enough not to need to involve himself in something like this for money, and unless he harbored some deep grudge against me from a past I didn't know about, there was no reason for him to deliberately put Morae nuna, hyung, or me in a difficult situation.

Morae took a slow breath and nodded carefully.

"Right. If Manager Han's involved too, it should be safe. You said they can leave as soon as tomorrow?"

"Huh? Ah, yeah..."

Then she squeezed my shoulder firmly and made her decision known.

"Let's rely on Seo Ihyeon this time."

· · · · ·

The moment I stepped out of the bathroom, the view stopped me again. The Han River at night—the same view I looked at every day from Manager Han's living room—yet every time it entered my sight when I wasn't braced for it, it struck me new. It didn't matter where I was seeing it from.

The city lights scattered across the calm water reminded me of Hong Kong at night. Memories of Hong Kong came in a chain, making me feel clearly how much I had changed, and how many chances I had been given to find my way here.

Back then, waiting in a hotel room for his call before going to meet Teacher Suki Kim. Now, standing at the window of the penthouse he had arranged for Morae nuna and Yeehan hyung. Both of those moments had been made by his goodwill.

Is it truly all right for you to be so complicated with me?

I had answered his question by saying I would repay the debt, even if it meant taking other work, but in truth I was afraid. Not afraid of some third-rate movie scenario—of being caught at a disadvantage, of being used.

As I came to understand that his large hands and broad embrace were not only cold and unyielding, as I slowly learned the many layers of his particular colors hidden beneath the surface—that was where the fear lived. The fear of where my heart and emotions were leading me, how deeply entangled I was becoming with him.

Buzz. Buzz. I turned back toward the bed as my phone vibrated where I'd left it and walked over. The name saved on the screen read: Director.

The clash of contradictory feelings—a sharp ache and a thrilling flutter attacking from both sides at once—was already more than I could easily carry. I breathed out slowly, sat on the mattress, and picked up the phone.

I cleared my throat and answered.

"Yes?"

[......]

As if he hadn't expected me to pick up. A beat of silence from the other end. Then a deep sigh, the kind that might be suppressing anger—or might be profound relief.

[Why wasn't the call connecting?]

"Oh—I was just getting out of the shower. Were you calling?"

[Don't be alarmed when you see the missed calls later. I don't have stalker tendencies. I was just worried when you weren't picking up today.]

"I'm sorry. I thought since I'd already told you I got in safely, everything would be fine..."

Both of them had accepted the plan and wanted to leave tomorrow. I had contacted him immediately outside the hotel. He'd said there was no problem, just pack your bags right away and head to the accommodation I've prepared.

After arriving at the penthouse in the car he had sent—a place he'd described as safe due to tight security—Morae and Yeehan had turned their worry toward me. What if the Director's goal isn't to hand us over to Father, but to earn your trust by treating us so well, and then sell you off somewhere?

What would he get by selling me off? The only thing that could be called a notable history was the faint trace of having painted, back when it still meant something.

I had contacted him the moment I walked through the door, before I'd even sat down, so it hadn't occurred to me that he would worry simply because the call didn't connect while I was showering.

[I suppose I sound like someone who'd want a report before every shower. Now that I say it out loud, I do seem like a strange person.]

He laughed, a little embarrassed at himself. I shook my head vigorously, even though he couldn't see it.

Considering the time, effort, and money he had poured into all of this, he had every right to know the details as thoroughly as he wanted.

"No—it's just that I'm not very accustomed to keeping in regular contact, so your concern doesn't seem... strange... I don't think..."

I felt like I might have been getting too worked up over something he had said without much thought behind it, and my voice softened and trailed off toward the end.

A brief silence on the other end of the line. Then he spoke with a very soft laugh in his voice.

[Thank you for defending me so earnestly on my behalf.]

A low resonance, like something vibrating deep metal from the base of his throat—a pleasant laugh and a pleasant voice.

Hearing his voice over the phone made me feel as if all the blood in my veins had drained away at once. I bit my lower lip and closed my eyes, a dim sense of dismay settling over me at the realization that this was more serious than I'd expected.

He wasn't making his voice especially sweet. I was simply receiving everything about him that way.

[So—today you're sleeping tucked in between your hyung and nuna, acting spoiled?]

The playfulness made his voice even better to listen to. To shake off the illusion of his broad chest pressed against my hunched back, I deliberately got up and moved toward the window.

[Someone who had such a passionate night yesterday pretending to be an innocent younger sibling who knows nothing, nestled between hyung and nuna... that's quite the scam.]

His tone was still playful, but I had no practiced ease to parry with. Frustrated by my inability to secure even a sliver of composure in his presence, I pressed my forehead against the glass—cooled by the air conditioning. This wasn't simply a matter of age or experience. It was more about personality.

Perhaps accustomed to my uninteresting reactions by now, he let out a small laugh to himself and shifted the subject naturally.

[How did your body feel today?]

"Better than... before."

The next topic was also high difficulty for me, but I didn't want to act like a fool this time. He was my first in everything, but I was still a proper adult.

[Hmm... that's good. I still wish you could have rested today. It was uncomfortable, wasn't it?]

"No, really... my body is fine. The... after..."

[After?]

He asked back, his voice curling up as if he didn't follow. I could almost see the clean lines of his face, one eyebrow lifted in mild confusion.

I pulled my forehead from the glass and looked forward. My own face, reflected in the black window that mirrored the nighttime city, was burning red.

"Because I... cleaned up right away... it was much better than last time."

[......]

His silence made my face heat further. I had wanted to say it casually, naturally—and I didn't think I had succeeded.

[Is it that hard to say "cleaned up"?]

I could hear the dangerous mischief in his voice.

[When we're doing it, you're so honest with me...]

"Director! You must have been exhausted today too, Director?"

I rushed to cut him off and my voice cracked—but he didn't laugh or tease me about that. Instead, he suffocated me with a silence that was even harder to endure. I could almost feel the weight of his grey-blue eyes, intent and unhurried, watching me.

Perhaps deciding to relent, he broke the silence with a soft chuckle.

[I came home this afternoon and slept well, so you don't need to worry. Missing one proper night of sleep isn't anything.]

It was astonishing enough that he had even thought about my wet clothes in a state where he hadn't slept at all—and yet here he was speaking as if everything he had arranged today was nothing. So that I wouldn't feel too guilty, or too grateful.

I perched on the low ledge beneath the floor-to-ceiling window and pulled the towel from around my neck, turning it over in my hands.

"Thank you so much for all of this... I wouldn't have known how to solve it on my own. There would have been no answer."

He was quiet for a moment. Not the kind of silence that gauges the weight of words or probes for weakness—the kind that leaves space empty, patiently waiting for something to settle into it. The kind I didn't want to break.

[So... you'll wear it, won't you? The sexy lingerie.]

I blinked at the direction that had taken, and then a light laugh escaped me.

[Hey—why are you trying to brush this off with a laugh? I'm being serious.]

He was deflecting my gratitude with practiced ease. I had to admit that his ability to resolve this situation wasn't solely a product of his wealth and connections.

I wondered, briefly, whether answering "okay" here would naturally append a new clause to our relationship—that we were people who satisfied each other's desires—and scrubbed my face with the towel.

Whether I wanted to push myself into that kind of relationship, whether I didn't—I had been about to say even that was uncertain. But that would have been dishonest.

I could no longer pretend not to know that, given the chance, I would sleep with him again without hesitation.

The faint laughter faded, and his voice turned more serious.

[I feel like I should tell Manager Han that you've started painting again. Regarding this matter—how much can I tell her? If there are parts you'd rather not share, or want to tell her yourself, I'll stay quiet about those. I know it may seem a little rushed, but once I've decided on something like this, I tend to want to get it cleanly down on paper.]

"Everything I told you—you can tell her all of it. It's fine."

[Very well. Then while you're having your farewell with hyung and nuna, I'll be busy drafting the contract that says all future paintings of yours belong to me.]

"I leave it in your hands."

I said it with a silent smile, trusting he would catch the faint trace of it in my voice.

[It's a small thing to ask, but please send me one message before you sleep tonight, and one when you wake up tomorrow.]

"I will."

After all that, he didn't say anything about hanging up. He simply went quiet again. I didn't offer a closing remark either. A silence built between us—not unpleasant, full of a kind of tension—like clumsy lovers early in a new relationship who can't quite bring themselves to end the call.

It was him who gently broke it first.

[It's your last night, and I've kept you too long. Well then—have a good time.]

The call had lasted nearly twenty minutes. Like finishing a film, there was a particular quality of aftertaste to it. Not wanting it to fade, I held the phone and sat there for a while before growing curious about the missed calls he had made while I was in the shower.

I had lingered a little longer than usual under the hot water, enjoying the languid loosening of fatigue—but the shower was still only about thirty minutes. In those thirty minutes, he had left twenty-six missed calls. The most I had ever received from any single person.

I chuckled—that explained the preemptive disclaimer about not having stalker tendencies—and got up. I tossed the phone onto the bed and started for the door, then stopped. I turned back, picked it up, and put it in my pants pocket. I didn't want to make him a stalker again.

In the living room, Yeehan and Morae were already drinking beer. The long, vertical room offered a much more open view than the guest room I'd just come from.

"Seo Ihyeon, this room is seven million won a night."

Morae, who had been looking at her phone beside hyung on one end of the sofa, turned toward me with a worried face as I sat down. Back when I had known less about his wealth, that number would have been difficult to believe. Even now it didn't quite feel real.

"You're not seriously being sold off to a deep-sea fishing trawler or something?"

She had apparently looked up the cost in the meantime and shoved her phone screen toward me.

"How much would I even fetch on a deep-sea fishing trawler?"

"Fair point. You've got more backbone than you look, but Seo Ihyeon isn't exactly built for hard labor."

Morae quickly agreed, reached for a fresh beer from the table, and handed it to me.

Twisting off the cap, I glanced sideways and saw two backpacks resting beside the single armchair across the room. Everything the two of them owned, packed for tomorrow—and it was remarkably sparse. They looked like people setting off on a light three-day domestic trip, not relocating to another country.

I looked at the pair of backpacks leaned back-to-back, then turned my head away and started drinking my beer.

"So—your Director. What exactly does he do? Is the gallery just a hobby, is he actually some third-generation chaebol?"

The main sofa was long and deep enough for all three of us with comfortable space between us. Morae, seated between Yeehan and me, leaned her head back and turned to look at me.

"Probably... something like that."

Considering what Yuni nuna and Juhan hyung had casually mentioned about his—or his family's—financial position back in Hong Kong, calling him a chaebol heir wouldn't be far from the truth.

"Still, the gallery isn't just a hobby for him."

Phantom meant more to him than a plausible title on a business card. No one would build a gallery from the ground up—enduring whispers about using pheromones to sell paintings—just for a line on a business card.

"Given that kind of wealth, it makes sense that he'd be sharp about these things. I don't know that world, but this doesn't seem like the scale of a neighborhood rich guy. And having money doesn't mean you get to grow up sheltered from reality. Political battles with outsiders, infighting within the family—you'd have no one to trust around you. He might have been exposed to some ugly situations from a young age. Looking at what he arranged—his skills are no joke."

Morae was talking about the escape plan he had put together.

While we had stopped by the "What Happened in Bali" owner's place to collect the luggage and then made our way here, he had created a temporary email address and sent through detailed documents of the plan he had prepared.

According to the plan, Yeehan and Morae were to depart tomorrow and arrive in Bali after fifteen nights and sixteen days, passing through a total of nine countries—not counting brief layovers. The route didn't rely on planes alone; there were segments where they would cross borders by boat and bus.

By making the route that complicated, he explained, tracking would be impossible for any private investigator, no matter how capable. Since it had come to this, he had also arranged the schedule to allow them to enjoy the journey—adding a smiley emoji and wishing them a good time.

After reviewing the plan, Morae had seemed to trust him completely. She had even used the word infatuated, and for once, hyung showed a rare flash of jealousy.

"Hey—where even is Minsk in Belarus? I didn't know that country had a city like that, let alone knew it existed."

Hyung, who had packed everything and was heading for the bedroom at last, turned back to call out. Nuna and I exchanged a look and smiled.

It had been a heavy day for all three of us. Tomorrow, a completely different life would begin. Without putting words to the sad exhaustion or the vague fear stirring in our chests, we were trying to spend the evening the way we always did.

This was our way. If we were the type to drag everything out and lay it bare and confirm it with each other... if that were Morae and hyung's way, I wouldn't have been able to endure it.

"Your Director."

"Huh?"

I had been staring at my beer bottle, lost in thought, and reacted too sharply at the mention of Director—like a thief caught mid-act.

"He must have enormous confidence in your talent. I don't know anything about that world, but still—paying that large a sum as an advance just from seeing one work, and helping out with something like this on top of it... that can't be ordinary. He must be completely captivated by your paintings."

It was coming from Morae nuna—a third party, someone who had never even met him—and it was about my art, not about me as a romantic interest. But hearing that he was captivated by some part of me... honestly, it felt good to hear.

Before I had ever experienced falling for someone with clumsy, earnest feelings—before I had ever felt that flutter, that particular rhythm of a heart beating differently from its daily pace—I had dulled my own emotions out of fear of where they might expand. The result was a dry, meager emotional range that wasn't stirred by much of anything I saw or heard.

It wasn't the kind of toughness formed through training. It was closer to depletion—having worn through the very material needed to feel and experience things richly.

The moisture seeping into even those dried-out sensibilities was strange to me.

And moreover: I held no optimism about a future with him, and I had no confidence to act toward one. And yet my ability to find reasons, moment by moment, to sustain these feelings toward him—that, at least, was something to be quietly astonished by.

Morae, sitting with her knees pulled up on the sofa, stared vaguely at the beer label and murmured almost to herself.

"They say meeting someone who recognizes your talent is just as important as the talent itself. You're lucky."

Her murmur—which seemed to leave out the words lucky to have met someone like that before we leave—reminded me that the unreal departure was happening tomorrow.

"Since we're moving out before the lease ends, we'll probably need to cover the agent's fee for finding the next tenant. We should get back a little under thirty million won. We'll pay your Director back with that first, and once we both get to Bali, we'll find work and send you a little each month. I'm looking into instructor spots at a Korean-run surf camp—since we're planning to stay long-term, they'll probably give us priority."

Three healthy people in their twenties should be able to pay back seventy million won quickly enough—don't stress about money, just focus on your art, she added. And she lightly ruffled my hair, smiling as if she knew exactly what I'd been worrying about.

Morae had stayed by my side since that vague, bewildering time when I didn't know how to handle my own existence.

Whether it was experience or something she was simply born with, the fact that his words had understood me just as well as hers did—that still felt astonishing, even now, thinking back on it.

"Isn't that why your Director helped us? To build an environment where you can paint without worrying. Whether that's because he's personally a fan of your work or because he has a gallery owner's instinct, either way—he must have judged that you're worth that investment. So just focus on your painting. Oh, and please keep it a secret from him that I initially suspected he might be in cahoots with my father."

I smiled at Morae's last words—but there was something in what she'd said that I couldn't let go of.

Unconsciously tilting the beer bottle in my hand, I found myself wanting to ask her something.

If I'd consulted Juhan hyung or Yuni nuna, they would have seen through who I was talking about in an instant. But Morae, who had never even met him—even if she guessed, the impact would be minimal. At least I wouldn't have to squirm in front of both of them at once.

"Nuna."

I pushed aside the soggy label—softened by the condensation on the bottle—with one finger, and opened my mouth with what felt like gravity.

"If... someone's parents had to go through something difficult because of them, and they feel guilty about it—would they probably hold a skeptical view of love or relationships?"

I immediately regretted being so direct.

"Like... they might have physical intimacy with someone, but draw a line before anything goes deeper..."

It was as nerve-wracking as confessing directly to him, my heart lodged somewhere in my throat. But I already knew it was ultimately pointless. What could I possibly confirm by asking someone who wasn't the person involved?

"I'm like that too, actually. I'm also... afraid of becoming someone's person. Of sharing everything with them."

That was why the thought of Morae nuna and Yeehan hyung breaking up frightened me too. The deeper the empathy when two people are together, the more destructive the severance. I had experienced that force hitting the very center of my existence. Both the impulse to leap toward someone and the impulse to flee—ultimately, those all trace back to things that have already happened.

"But isn't that the same as saying you're drawn to it even though it scares you?"

"Huh... huh?"

"You keep being drawn to that person—that's why you're asking. Isn't it."

"......"

Morae's face as she asked was calm. I hadn't said I was drawn to anyone—but she was asking with complete certainty. There seemed no point in denying it. I managed a nod, my face burning.

"Then couldn't it be the same for that person? Just as you can't help being drawn to him even in your unstable state—couldn't someone appear for him too, someone he wants badly enough to break past his skepticism and cross his own lines?"

Romantic feelings aren't decorations placed on top of a tower built from logic, people say. He could be swept away by something he didn't choose, even against himself. But imagining that I could be the one to shake him so deeply, to bring his whole structure down—that was somehow difficult to picture.

"Honestly, I'm scared too."

Morae's voice had dropped suddenly, as if she'd become conscious of someone overhearing. I looked at her face, unsure if I'd misheard, but she seemed completely absorbed in thought and didn't notice my gaze.

"Earlier I spoke as if I had the confidence not to be swayed by mere whims of the heart—but as uncle said, hearts can change, and no one can be certain about the future. Whatever ending awaits, I won't regret the act of choosing it myself—but that doesn't mean I'm not at all afraid of the pain that choice might bring. Whether it's the loss of parting from Seo Yeehan, or guilt toward my family...."

Morae took a few more sips of beer and looked down at the scattered printed documents on the table—the materials he had sent her—then continued.

"In the end, I think what matters is figuring out what causes you more pain. For me, making a choice without fully examining what I want and handing it to someone else—that itself is painful. But for someone else, the vagueness of having no guarantee of safety might be more painful. Even if there are general measures, the actual sensation of happiness or pain differs from person to person. It might not be that you're not afraid—it might be that this is a choice made to avoid something even more terrifying."

She finished speaking calmly, then suddenly turned to look at me, narrowing her eyes into a smile.

"But—is this about Rabbit, by any chance?"

Heat ignited instantly across my face and the tips of my ears, impossible to hide.

That Morae—who had never once met him—could see through me this easily. I thought, I have to keep this from Yuni nuna and Juhan hyung no matter what, and my body trembled slightly with the light fear of what would happen if those two ever found out.

"Hmm, I see... So that's how it was."

She muttered something incomprehensible with that suggestive smile, her eyes still narrowed. I couldn't tell what she was agreeing to, but I didn't have the courage to ask—afraid it would lead to more questions about me.

"What a shame. Seo Ihyeon's first love—and I have to leave without ever getting to see his face."

After that, Morae didn't pry any further.

But as sweet as her guess was—that he had been completely captivated by my paintings—the definition of this feeling as "first love" was simply bewildering.

The word "first love" carries an impression somehow different from a second or third love.

It suggests a clumsy honesty and freshness—throwing yourself forward without calculation, raw and unguarded—like the tender kind of leaf that could never bloom on a dried-out branch. A short, incredulous laugh escaped me, the way it does when you're confronted with one of your own absurd mistakes.

I had no intention of claiming I'd fallen for him over a few nights and a handful of conversations. Love, as I understand it, isn't that uncomplicated a concept.

But this feeling had the potential to become love. And love was still the most frightening change I could imagine. And yet I was doing nothing to control it. For the foolish reason, the only reason, that it didn't hurt right now.

If the way he looked at me and spoke to me had stayed as indifferent as it was at first, I would have let this feeling dry up before it could grow—if only to avoid the immediate pain.

He had told me to send a message before bed, but I wanted to call. I wanted to hear his voice. I wanted to see his face. I wanted to hold him, to touch his bare skin, to feel his warmth. And I wanted to tell him all of that.

I imagined actually doing it—the confession, out loud. The next scene that unfolded in that imagining was his face, awkward and slightly pained, laughing it off while he looked somewhere else.