It was music that grabbed the ears — a catchy melody and a singing style to match. Not a fast-tempo track with a stimulating beat, but its funky rhythm was charming enough to make even someone as easily bored as me wiggle my toes inside my sneakers.

It was a famous song, famous enough that even I knew it. Prince's "Kiss."

Yuni nuna, sitting in the passenger seat, and Juhan hyung, sitting next to me in the back, were singing along at the top of their lungs, practically screaming.

"Smooch, smooch, smooch, smooch, smooch. Kiss!"

After belting out the rather explicit lyrics with everything they had, the two of them mimicked kissing sounds into the air in time with the sound effect at the end of the first verse. I couldn't help laughing at how perfectly synchronized they were, as if they'd rehearsed it. It was the kind of harmony that could only exist between people who had shared tastes for a long, long time.

He was visible in the rearview mirror from the driver's seat — smiling and shaking his head as if he couldn't help himself. Maybe it was my imagination, but I thought our eyes met in the mirror. I couldn't be certain since he was wearing sunglasses, but the moment felt oddly awkward. I pretended to brush my windblown hair aside and looked away.

Having left the airport, passed through the glamorous luxury streets and underground tunnels of Tsim Sha Tsui, and entered Hong Kong Island, we were now driving along an elevated road. To our right, modern skyscrapers coexisted with older buildings; to our left, Victoria Harbour offered a view across to Tsim Sha Tsui.

The car was a deep blue — the color of a lake with great depth — a cabriolet, convertible, or in more common terms, an open-top car. I had no idea who had left it waiting at the arrivals gate, but it was definitely not a rental. He had taken the key directly from his own key wallet.

When they spotted the waiting car, Yuni nuna and Juhan hyung had screamed and run toward it, as boisterous as if reuniting with long-lost family. Whether the car had been specially prepared for the two of them or not, an unmistakable smile crossed the Director's face as he watched them.

He was a kind boss to his employees. I had known that much even during his initial hostility toward me. He wasn't a person fundamentally lacking in warmth — not someone who was simply cold toward everyone.

However, that kindness wasn't open to everyone equally. To be included, one had to spend time proving oneself to him. Proving they were worthy of receiving his warmth.

I wasn't sure how he was coming to define me. His attitude had softened since the beginning, and he'd made the unexpected decision to let me join Phantom. The kindness of giving me his jacket and the sweatshirt off his back. And the occasional gaze he directed my way — warm, with a certain weight to it — led me to guess that at least he no longer viewed me with the same wariness as before.

While pretending to watch the Hong Kong scenery approaching through the windshield and stealing glances at the back of his head as he drove, I was lost in these thoughts as "Kiss" drew to a close.

"Ah, this is why I work at Phantom!"

Yuni nuna turned down the volume and exclaimed with a look of relief, like someone who had finally vented at a karaoke room after far too long.

"Hey… doesn't that sting, coming from someone the boss is listening to?"

"Why would it sting? It's a compliment. Do you think bosses who can take you for rides in cars like this are common? Even if they exist, they wouldn't do it."

"Hmm, but what's the point if the boss bought the car with inherited money?"

"As long as the car I ride in and the house I live in are bought with money I earned myself, that's enough. This is the Director's car. So I just need to enjoy it, and any hand-wringing about inherited wealth is the Director's problem to deal with."

Saying this, Yuni nuna clapped her hands in a teasing little flourish and laughed. He shook his head.

"Wow… ruthless, Baek Yuni."

"The Director is just too uptight about things like that. Enjoy it. It's wonderful that you can give happiness to the babies this way. Inheriting a lot isn't all advantages — if you don't even enjoy the advantages you have, that's a loss."

Juhan hyung stuck his head between the driver's and passenger's seats and joined the conversation.

"I completely agree with Baek Yuni on this one. If it really bothers you, there's always the option of handing it all over to me. We're your babies, after all."

In the rearview mirror, he made a disgusted face this time.

"Did you catch something from Choi Inwu? Why are you two suddenly obsessed with calling me 'baby'? Why would you be my babies? It's creepy coming from grown adults."

"Anyway, you'd call your lover 'honey' or 'baby' regardless, Director. Aren't your lovers grown adults too? They're probably big, muscular types. Ugh…"

Juhan hyung still seemed to take what had been said in the garden last time as established fact. Since he hadn't explicitly denied or confirmed it, I couldn't know whether muscular men were truly his type — but he had slept with me, and I wasn't particularly muscular. Of course, we hadn't gone all the way, and if my hazy memory was correct… I had passed out before he could even finish.

"If it's a lover, it's a lover — what do you mean 'lovers'? And have you ever even seen my 'honey' or 'baby'? See them first, then talk."

As he smoothly descended from the elevated road and slowed for a straight-ahead signal, he reached between the seats and pinched Juhan hyung's cheek where it had poked through.

The members of Phantom seemed close — closer than a simple workplace relationship — yet they didn't seem to know much about his private life. Inwu hyung, his longtime friend, appeared to be the same way. Being open and affectionate with those close to him while keeping his private world entirely to himself seemed to be his habit. This likely applied not just to what happened in bed, but to his entire private life.

I found myself wondering whether anyone, past or present, had ever managed to enter the inner world he guarded so carefully. Driven by that curiosity, I unconsciously found myself studying his face in the rearview mirror.

I knew well enough that I wasn't skilled in these things. Conversely, detecting the clumsy, furtive gaze of someone ten years younger stealing glances would be nothing to him. Feeling as though our eyes had met again in the mirror, I quickly turned to look out at the exotic streets.

We were pressing deeper into the chaotic streets of Hong Kong — a jumble of red signs covered in brushstroke-style Chinese characters, dazzling electronic billboards, and neon lights.

The car moved with the signal, and at the next intersection slid through without needing to stop.

"Huh? What is it, Director? Why aren't we heading toward the apartment?"

Yuni nuna glanced back at the uphill road on the right and asked in a puzzled voice.

"Didn't I mention it? We're staying at a hotel this time."

"This is the first I'm hearing of it."

"Hmm… I thought I had told you."

He scratched under his chin with his index finger and said it with a perfectly straight face. For reasons unknown, judging by her reaction, it seemed highly probable he had deliberately stayed quiet about it.

"Even if we are staying at a hotel, since when have you handled logistics like that, Director? Huh?"

Nuna, looking slightly flustered by the change in plans, pointed her phone at him with a fierce expression.

"You looked so busy, Baek Yuni — I thought if I asked you to book a hotel on top of everything else, you might grab me by the collar, so I took care of it myself."

At his gently teasing tone, nuna sank back into her seat and pushed up her sunglasses.

"Even so, I wouldn't grab you by the collar. I might have glared hard enough to bore a hole through the back of your head, though."

He laughed and reached out to lightly ruffle nuna's hair.

"You need proper rest at night during the fair. My apartment doesn't have enough rooms for all five of us to sleep separately."

"The master bedroom is like a sports field. If we each sleep on opposite ends of that bed, it's practically like having separate rooms. Ihyeon won't take up much space either. And unlike Kwon Juhan, he won't complain about this or that."

"Why are you dragging me into this when I'm just sitting here quietly?"

Juhan hyung grumbled, but nuna didn't react to it.

"Hmm… So you're saying Seo Ihyeon and I should share a room?"

This time, I was certain he was looking at me in the rearview mirror. His expression was that of someone imagining, even if only in his head, what it would be like to share a room with me.

"Why? Can't you even share a room with a man you're not into?"

Yuni nuna bristled, but he just laughed. Then he changed the subject.

"You won't forgive me, even though it's Hotel F?"

Nuna's expression shifted at the name of the hotel. Juhan hyung's ears perked up too, and he turned to look at me with wide eyes — but I had no information about that hotel and couldn't share in their reaction.

"No, it's not about forgiving or not… It's just that if there are changes, you should let us know in advance."

Rubbing her finger across the dashboard, nuna couldn't hide her smile.

"Even for a harbor view, one room per person?"

"Whether you tell us in advance or not — does it really matter that much?"

Nuna changed her tune instantly, as if nothing had happened, and turned to share her joy with Juhan hyung. That hotel was clearly exciting them both quite a bit. Perhaps this, too, was part of the surprise gift he had prepared for them.

"Honestly, spending the Director's money in Hong Kong doesn't even feel like a waste."

"You don't feel bad spending my money in Seoul either."

"You're rich!"

Nuna and hyung shouted in unison. He shook his head, but he was smiling.

Keeping a large, old-looking beige building to his right, he turned the steering wheel left. Soon, the lavishly decorated hotel entrance appeared. The car slowed, but my heart seemed to race ahead of it.

My first impression of Hong Kong was passionate humidity and heat, a blend of past and present, a subtle balance born from disorder, and gazes probing each other through a rearview mirror.

· · · · ·

Phantom was exhibiting about 120 pieces at this art fair.

Without any time to marvel at the gorgeous harbor view of Victoria Harbour and Tsim Sha Tsui from the hotel room, or at the interior décor, we headed straight to the exhibition hall and began unpacking the roughly 120 paintings from their bubble wrap.

Since we would have to rewrap the pieces in the same bubble wrap after the exhibition, we couldn't just tear it off haphazardly. The work of carefully unwrapping the layers that all five of us had spent the night securing could have been tedious, but perhaps owing to a light undercurrent of excitement, I felt neither boredom nor physical exhaustion. Unwrapping was also simpler than the wrapping had been.

He dropped us off and left the hotel right away to meet with gallery contacts from other cities we had been in communication with, and Manager Han was scheduled to arrive a few hours later after wrapping up Phantom's business in Seoul. So the display setup fell to the three of us.

The VIP preview opening event was scheduled to begin in five hours. We had to finish the display before then, return to the hotel to get ready, and come back again. The schedule wasn't generous, but we had enough confidence in our workflow by now.

Yuni nuna was in charge of unpacking, and Juhan hyung was responsible for setting up the unwrapped pieces. I moved back and forth between them, lending a hand wherever it was needed at any given moment.

"Those guys are infuriating, honestly."

As I passed the thirty-second piece — received from nuna — over to Juhan hyung, he glanced over my shoulder at the booth across from us and muttered under his breath. I casually looked back, and well… their situation was quite different from ours.

Unlike our booth, which was cluttered with separated bubble wrap and still-wrapped paintings monopolizing the entire space, the staff at the booth across the aisle were chatting leisurely while setting up their display. At a glance, they had brought maybe thirty pieces at most, so there was no need for them to rush.

"They already sell their work for good prices back home, so there's no reason to burden themselves with airfare, shipping costs, and staff travel expenses to haul everything over here. And they probably brought expensive pieces that would recoup their investment with just a few sales."

Yuni nuna said this while unwrapping with practiced, skillful hands. Her explanation continued.

"Compared to small-to-medium-sized galleries back home, we're actually quite lucky to participate in international art fairs at all. Still, we'll probably have to keep grinding like this, hauling over a hundred pieces, for a few more years. Just watch — someday, I'm going to bring only twenty pieces, hang them up quickly, and head out for noodles at Kau Kee."

Even though she seemed calm, nuna clearly felt competitive toward them too; she even stopped her unpacking to raise a fist in the air. If nuna said she'd do it, it felt like she really would.

"Even so, they'll be stuck in cramped business hotels suffering from tourist noise. The only staff in this entire venue who got to ride here from the airport in a Phantom and have individual rooms at Hotel F — that's us. Even big galleries like Perrotin or Gagosian wouldn't go that far. In a way, we're the victors."

Carefully lifting the next piece fresh from its bubble wrap, I carried it over to where Juhan hyung was standing. He hung the painting in the position marked on the layout diagram we had prepared, then drew a line through number 33 on the list.

"That car earlier — its name was Phantom, wasn't it?"

I asked casually while helping nuna remove the tape from the bubble wrap. Without stopping her work, nuna glanced up at me, gave me a quick look, and smiled.

"Yeah, funny, right? I don't know whether the car Phantom came first or the gallery Phantom, but it seems to be the Director's thing. He apparently owns about three or four Phantom models alone. The one in Seoul is a Ghost — considered the baby Phantom model — but calling it a baby… it's bigger than most full-size luxury sedans. Cheaper than the Phantom, sure, but still costs over 400 million won, so if you had to put a name to it, it's more like a giant baby?"

Handing me the thirty-fourth piece, nuna added:

"From what I can tell, what matters to the Director isn't the price or prestige of those cars. It's the name. Phantom, Ghost… in the end, they're all spirits, aren't they?"

Gallery Phantom.

Thinking of his pale blue eyes — as fleeting as seafoam — and his indifferent, detached aura, it was certainly a fitting name. I had never thought about whether there was a reason behind it, but the psychology of collecting expensive cars named Phantom and Ghost, fixating on the meaning of "spirit" — that didn't seem like simple collector's obsession.

But since even nuna and Juhan hyung didn't know the full story, it was clear that if I asked, he would just shrug and change the subject.

"So until now, whenever you came to Hong Kong on a business trip, you stayed at the Director's apartment."

It felt like a good moment to bring up the question that had been on my mind since the drive to the hotel.

Juhan hyung, who had just drawn a line through number 34, put the cap back on the pen he'd been holding in his mouth and answered.

"Yeah, that's right. This is the first time staying at a hotel. He has an apartment below Victoria Peak — it's on a hill and high up, so the view is incredible. He also owns a mansion with a pool not too far from there. That one is probably rented out. I heard some major bank here rented it for their employees or something."

Hyung looked down at nuna as if requesting further explanation, and she picked up where he left off.

"It's used as company-provided housing for high-level talent brought in from overseas. The monthly rent is something like 20 million won — and the company covers that. I wonder how much profit that one person generates to justify such an expense. Well, it's a world completely unrelated to ours."

The story of the high-level employee whose tens-of-millions-per-month rent was paid by the company was one thing, but the Director — as the property owner earning tens of millions in monthly rental income — was equally from another world entirely compared to me. The fact that I knew him, that he existed within the sphere of my life, made that feel all the more true.

Liu Weikun.

From his name alone, I could tell from the start that his nationality was Hong Kong. Through conversations with Manager Han, hyung, and nuna, I had a rough sense that he was of mixed heritage with one Korean parent. I knew he hadn't been born and raised in Seoul, but learning that he was wealthy enough to own property of that magnitude in Hong Kong was new information.

According to what he had said in the car on the way to the hotel, the source of his wealth in Hong Kong seemed to be mostly inheritance. He was clearly not from an ordinary family.

"It might not be his personally — it could be his family's. They own a house in Repulse Bay, a neighborhood full of extraordinarily wealthy people by the sea. It's a vacation home, and last year, after the art fair ended, we all spent about three days there together. Ah… it was really wonderful."

Juhan hyung's eyes traced the air with a wistful gaze, like an older person reminiscing about the golden days long past.

The wealthiest person I had actually known was Morae nuna's father, Mr. Lim. The billions Mr. Lim reportedly earned in a year were numbers that never quite registered for me. It was unreasonable for someone like me to grasp the true scale of his wealth.

"What does all this mean?"

Nuna suddenly stopped her hands and drew our attention to herself. She then answered her own question.

"It means Phantom isn't a matter of survival for the Director — it's a matter of self-affirmation."

"……"

"The real estate the Director owns isn't even the whole of it. The house and gallery in Seoul are his too, but those don't even register as major assets. As far as we know, he owns mansions in South Kensington in London and the Upper East Side in New York, and there might be even more properties held for investment purposes. That's why he didn't start Phantom just to make a living."

Nuna handed me the thirty-fifth piece and stood up briefly, patting her legs and lower back, probably stiff from crouching for so long.

"In Seoul, he's a self-made Golden Alpha who climbed up from nothing by himself, but in Hong Kong…"

"He's just royalty, plain and simple."

While nuna searched for the right words, Juhan hyung delivered the conclusion. Nuna frowned slightly, seemingly dissatisfied with the expression, but she couldn't come up with anything more fitting.

"That's right — a prince. Though I much prefer the Director in Seoul."

Juhan hyung didn't respond to nuna's words. Instead, he hung the thirty-fifth piece on the wall with a faint smile — a rare sight from him. It was unmistakably an expression of agreement. He too preferred the Director as he was in Seoul.

They were two people who were completely open about their worldly pleasures — enthusiastic about luxury cars, unable to hide their joy at the prospect of staying in five-star hotels — and yet, even so, they preferred him when he was in Seoul.

That might have seemed contradictory at first glance, but from my perspective, having spent only a few months with them, I dared to say that kind of contradiction didn't feel uncomfortable at all.

The two were clearly worldly, but in some ways they were also the people who most fiercely challenged that worldliness. It seemed contradictory, but undeniably, that was the identity of Baek Yuni and Kwon Juhan.

"Wow, it must be pouring rain in Korea right now. They say Seoul's rainfall today is over 60 millimeters?"

Juhan hyung said this in a raised voice while glancing at his phone as he waited for the next piece. It was news that felt impossible to imagine given the perfectly clear weather in Hong Kong.

"Hey, if you have time to check your phone, come help peel at least one of these."

"I wasn't slacking — I was checking whether Manager Han could safely board her flight."

"You can't even make a decent excuse."

As they peeled the cover off the thirty-sixth large-scale piece — its combined width and height exceeding seven meters — Juhan hyung grinned and tapped Yuni nuna on the shoulder.

"It'll still be monsoon season when we get back to Korea, but still — escaping for a few days is better than nothing, right? And everywhere here has the AC blasting."

Before I realized it, the two had shifted from their discussion of real estate across various world cities back to the present, happily talking about the simple pleasure of escaping the humid rainy season for a few days on this business trip. It was a remarkable sense of balance.

About four hours remained until the VIP preview event.

· · · · ·

Our booth wasn't particularly large relative to the number of pieces, since we couldn't pour in the budget that the "rich galleries" — as nuna and hyung described them — could afford.

A booth that was too large wouldn't have been practical anyway, since nuna and hyung were essentially responsible for managing it on their own, aside from him and Manager Han, who often had to step away.

The location, however, was quite good. It wasn't far from the experimental large-scale sculpture installed in the center, and there was ample space between us and the booth across the aisle.

Manager Han and he were walking side by side down that corridor. They were such a captivating pair that my gaze followed their movements even knowing it might look foolish.

I recalled Juhan hyung's exaggerated comment from some time ago — that seeing Shushu in person had nearly made him want to bow. It wasn't quite that level of shock, but it certainly wasn't everyday beauty either. Not enough to prostrate myself, but I couldn't tear my eyes away from the magnetic pull they exerted.

As it was a VIP preview, the venue was packed with stylish people in what I could only think of as party attire — utterly unfamiliar to me. Hyung, nuna, and I had also dressed in the neat black-toned outfits we'd prepared in advance and had our hair styled differently than usual, but we couldn't compare to the presence of those two.

They were the definition of the high-society Alphas I had never had cause to encounter back in that small fishing village.

"Manager Han, you look incredible! You're really radiating that Alpha energy after so long!"

Apparently I wasn't the only one thinking that, because Juhan hyung ran ahead to the booth and caused a commotion, hugging Manager Han.

"What do you mean, 'after so long'? What am I like usually? Huh?"

Manager Han laughed and grabbed Juhan hyung by the back of his neck. Though she was wearing a sharply tailored black two-piece suit — unlike her usual comfortable attire — her tone and actions were exactly the Manager Han everyone knew.

"Even in jeans and a T-shirt you're stylish, but dressed up like this is a different kind of cool entirely."

"Well, that's true. There is something to suddenly putting on a suit when you usually walk around in a T-shirt and ripped jeans."

Still holding the back of Juhan hyung's neck, Manager Han draped an arm over his shoulder and surveyed the completed display behind us, eyes widening.

"Hey… look at what our crew can do. I really didn't expect them to finish in just three hours. Maybe we can increase the number of pieces for the next fair?"

"Ha… I love Phantom, but I think I'll be submitting my resignation now."

Everyone burst out laughing at Juhan hyung's earnest joke.

All five of us were still pre-dinner, each for their own scheduling reasons. They began to quiet their hunger with simple food from the buffet tables set up around the venue.

Though I said "simple," with event tickets priced at around 4,000 Hong Kong dollars each, the variety and quality of the food were superb. To me, the dishes were so beautifully presented it almost felt like a shame to eat them.

"It's overwhelming for a first fair, isn't it?"

I must have been hungry — the only thing I'd managed to eat all day was the chicken dish served during the flight — but excitement and nerves were keeping me from feeling it. I was just prodding a tiny, dainty-looking dim sum with my chopsticks when he appeared at my side and started talking.

He had claimed he was starving, having had no time to eat while flashing business smiles nonstop, yet he also wasn't touching much of the food. He was only sipping champagne while picking at a few nuts that Juhan hyung had brought over.

"A little… but it's still fun."

Wearing a navy suit made of a material that flowed smoothly along the lines of his body rather than being stiffly angular, he looked accustomed to these settings — and he belonged in them. While boldly revealing his solid, well-proportioned physique, his suit remained dignified and elegant.

Visitors of various ethnicities touring the booths invariably paused to look at him at least once, and this in turn pulled them directly toward our booth.

"The actual event starts tomorrow, so it's going to get even more hectic. There will be incomparably more visitors than right now. Would you like to look around some of the pieces beforehand?"

With about 200 galleries from 26 countries participating, the venue's interior was substantial. That vast space was divided into hundreds of booths, forming a complex maze. I had picked up a pamphlet with a floor plan, but I honestly lacked the courage to venture out on my own. Not just because of the complicated layout — I was slightly daunted by everything being unfamiliar at once: foreign country, unfamiliar city, language barrier.

"If it's because it feels unfamiliar, I could go with you."

As if sensing my hesitation, he offered with a slight, crooked smile. Sometimes he smiled like a villain in an animated film, and this was one of those times. Don't want to go? Would you rather not go — just get into bed together? It was the same feeling as when we had slept together.

I nodded without refusing. His eyes, which had been fixed on me as he sipped his champagne, paused for a moment before crinkling at the corners in a smile. This time, it was a smile that seemed to lightly regret his own teasing from a moment ago.

He said we could take as much time as we wanted, strolling through and pausing as long as we liked in front of anything that caught my eye. As he spoke, he fell into step beside me, matching my pace.

"Do you like the room?"

As we passed by the booth of a gallery from Beijing, decorated primarily with Eastern paintings, he asked casually.

"It's my first time somewhere like that… I was surprised by how nice the room is. The view is incredible too. If it weren't for the Director's generosity, I never would have had this kind of experience… Thank you for everything."

"Hmm, it wasn't out of generosity."

I turned to look at him as he murmured that, his tone playful. His light blue eyes were sparkling.

"It's full of ulterior motives."

"……"

"To get Seo Ihyeon to pick up a brush."

I don't know what I had been expecting from the words "ulterior motives." I quickly averted my gaze, afraid he might see the disappointment on my face. But even when he wasn't within my line of sight, the mere fact of being within his made me feel as though everything I wanted to keep hidden would be laid bare.

Even if it was just the defensive delusion of someone considerably younger than him, this feeling of being at a disadvantage whenever I was in his presence kept nagging at me.

He had been tapping the rolled-up pamphlet against his palm; then he reversed it and tapped it against my shoulder.

"It seems like the best possible arrangement for you, Seo Ihyeon, since you have to keep a low profile. I don't know who's chasing you or why, but if you become a contracted artist for Phantom, I'll protect you with everything I've got. I'm good at that sort of thing."

I managed an awkward smile at his childlike boasting tone, as if he were proudly announcing he knew how to read and write. He was deliberately lightening the weight of his words with a casual air, but what he said was probably true. Given his methods and the shrewdness he showed in running Phantom, he was certainly not the type to stand by while someone took what was his.

However, what I was being chased over wasn't a simple matter ending with just me, and even if he protected me, it would only be because I was an artist worth investing in. Or, putting it in the best possible light, a business decision on the part of a dealer responsible for a talented artist — or so he seemed to consider me.

I wasn't hoping for anything more than that. If I wanted anything at all, it would be the safety of Morae nuna and Yeehan hyung — not my own well-being, which was, at best, a footnote to Morae nuna's father.

I was simply turning over the true meaning behind his words, "I'll protect you." It was a dangerous way of speaking.

He was appealing once more to the psychology of someone like me — anxious about safety while being chased — by highlighting the advantages of becoming a Phantom artist. But he didn't press for an answer right then. After all, we had mutually agreed the decision would be made after the business trip.

Although the star artist Shushu was a photographer, and the gallery occasionally had sculptors on its roster, Phantom was fundamentally a gallery focused on painting. Still, even someone as ignorant of art world news as I was had a vague sense that contemporary art had long since expanded its domain to include installation art, sculptures, and performances that invited audience participation.

Because of this, the atmosphere at the event was considerably more dynamic and vibrant than stuffy or authoritative. Works with humor and individuality predominated over classical, somber pieces. At a glance, that was the impression.

Nevertheless, I found myself uninterested in anything that wasn't painting.

"You don't seem very interested in recent artists."

He addressed me with curiosity as I stopped in front of a piece depicting a close-up of a woman lying on her side on the floor. I checked the caption: a work from 2002.

Though there were many art books at home, I had always been like a child who only looked at the illustrations and never read the text — I took in the works themselves and paid little attention to the artist's name or the title. Neither my mother nor my father, nor my Teacher, had ever tried to teach me about the lineage of painters or art history.

"I… don't know much about artists."

"Looking at it, you keep stopping in front of works by older artists. Artists who were at least active in the 1990s. This piece is relatively recent, though."

"Is that so."

I turned my head back toward the painting.

The woman in the painting seemed to be in a painful situation, but strangely, what emanated from her wasn't frustration, helplessness, or erosion — it was a vital, pulsing life force, like a beating heart. Different from romantic optimism like hope or dreams. It was closer to a warning: that even if someone harmed her, even if it led to her death, they could never dominate her spirit. What I sensed there was rather a frenzied struggle — a humanity that bled and stayed warm, that refused to give up being itself even at the extreme.

Even if I couldn't know the artist's true intention or what had drawn them to paint this piece, that was the feeling I received from the work in that moment.

The more I looked, the more it drew me in. I wanted, if possible, to place my hand on the hardened texture of the paint and vaguely feel the artist's breath and energy.

"For a piece to be evaluated purely on its artistic merit, independent of marketing or gallery power, ten years isn't even enough these days. All the works Seo Ihyeon seems interested in right now… their value continues to climb even now — at a minimum twenty years later, at a maximum a hundred."

I felt his gaze and looked over at him. He was looking at me with eyes that seemed to be exploring something interesting. His eyes were shining — sparkling like waves breaking finely under sunlight. Undeniably beautiful.

"And you seem to prefer quite wild pieces. I wouldn't have thought that matched your usual personality. Or perhaps… maybe that's not entirely true either?"

His low, drawn-out voice commenting on my personality was pulling something private inward at that moment. The way he watched me — steadily, from beneath lowered eyelids, rubbing his chin with his arms crossed — instantly changed the color of the air between us.

I didn't know how to respond to his last remark, unsure whether he was asking for an answer or simply speaking to himself.

But his observation that I seemed to prefer wild works wasn't wrong. Whatever it was, I liked works that revealed themselves as they truly were. It had always been that way.

The reason was simple. Simply put… the language they used was similar to my own. It was a language I could understand.

As we lingered before the painting, a gallery staff member approached and asked if we needed more detailed information about it. He smiled politely and declined, and we moved on.

He, who had been following my pace, stopped first in front of a booth belonging to a gallery from New York. More precisely, in front of a single piece displayed near the booth's entrance.

His gaze maintained its usual composure, but something about it was subtly different. Closer to a chilling cynicism than objective detachment.

"What about this piece?"

As he asked and turned to look at me, his expression quickly shifted into a playful smile. He tilted his head slightly, pointing at the artwork as if knocking on empty air, and looked at me. His cheerful tone seemed, conversely, to reveal a twisted state of mind.

I looked at the painting again, carefully.

The canvas, which appeared to be about four meters wide by four meters tall, was an abstract work featuring complex, intertwined curves of various colors against a deep, blood-red background. Yet no matter how intently I tried to focus, I could only vaguely sense the colors and atmosphere rather than any coherent energy or emotion.

Despite the use of intense colors and the arrangement of large, potentially engaging curves in abundance, it somehow didn't appear bold.

Because it was trying not to show anything at all.

This was completely different from the feeling I had gotten from Inwu hyung's paintings — that honest exposure of one's own dishonesty. This piece was trying to conceal its dishonesty, and beyond that, was using various techniques and devices to construct a false self, presenting it as though it were the real thing.

Hoping it might offer a hint for appreciating the work, I checked the caption. The title was Lovers on the Bed. A title more naturally suited to a figurative or realistic painting than an abstract one. I looked at the painting again. It was like holding a map while surrounded by fog, unable to see the road. Like a quiz where the answer refuses to come even with a hint.

"I… don't really understand it."

"……"

His gaze, demanding a more specific explanation, resembled that of a teacher hoping his favorite student would astonish the world by giving a wise answer to a foolish question. Since I couldn't tell which direction he wanted the answer to lean, I had no choice but to speak honestly.

"I can see the technique — the use of color, the composition — but none of it connects to any particular message or feeling. I'm not good at putting things into words… It's like when you've only ever exchanged greetings, pleasantries, or business talk with someone, so you can't really know them. That's the feeling I get."

"You can be more honest."

He was convinced I was hiding a harsher critique. He was pushing me, urging me to pour it out without any pretense of politeness. Looking at him — eyes sparkling, a smile playing on his lips — I hesitated, then opened my mouth.

"It's form without substance… like a magnificent bowl and table setting with no food to actually taste and savor. That's how it feels to me."

I didn't want to speak about another person's work that way. Even if it was purely my own impression, from someone who had never properly studied painting, and even if the artist wasn't listening somewhere.

Whether a work honestly revealed itself or not, it was still a fragment torn from an individual — and unless it was praise, I didn't particularly want to discuss it out loud.

Yet contrary to my feelings, he turned completely away from the painting to face me, his expression utterly satisfied. His movements were almost buoyant. A smile seemed to overflow from his lips — the most abundant smile he had ever shown, and it was because of me and no one else.

What could possibly please him so much?

"This is why I feel like I'm treating Seo Ihyeon like a fortune teller. What do you see in this painting, what do you see in that one?"

Then he bent his waist slightly to meet my eyes at the same height.

"But… that fortune teller really is something."

His face was still smiling, but for a moment I felt a chilling coldness emanating from him. The blue in his eyes intensified, as if ice flowers were scattering. That chill wasn't directed at me, but the back of my neck still prickled.

That he called me "really something" meant, in other words, that he completely agreed with my assessment of the painting. He was directing a very cold, sharp sarcasm toward that piece — toward Lovers on the Bed.

"Are you interested in the artwork? May I help you?"

He and I turned our heads toward the voice. A middle-aged, medium-height Caucasian man, whose belly was starting to protrude and whose hairline was beginning to thin, approached us with a gentle smile.

People were generally kind to him. His handsome appearance played a part, but anyone would naturally be warm toward a "client" who appeared to have the financial means to purchase anything on the spot, regardless of what was being sold.

"I personally scouted this artist, so I can recommend them with full confidence. They're one of the young artists currently making waves in the New York art scene. I imagine you may have heard their name. They're gaining attention for their sensual use of color and bold expression. They're a Korean artist in their twenties, and with the current rise of East Asian artists globally, their investment value is quite high. Their style seems like it would suit you perfectly. Besides this piece, there are two more works by the same artist — would you like to take a look?"

The man who had initially given a round, warm impression had an extraordinary gleam in his eyes upon closer inspection. Despite his relaxed expression, his ceaseless flow of words gave us — or rather, him — no room to interject. Just keeping up with his speech was a struggle with my English, which was limited to what I had learned through high school.

Hearing that he had personally scouted the artist, I glanced at the ID badge hanging around the man's neck: the title "Director" was attached before a rather common name, the kind you often encounter in English-language dramas or films. He wasn't just a staff member — he was someone in a leadership position at the gallery.

"Sensual and confident…"

Tilting his body slightly to face the painting halfway again, he murmured as if savoring the man's words, tapping his own cheek with the rolled-up end of the pamphlet he held clasped in his arm. Then, turning only his face back toward me:

"Do I suit that painting?"

He asked in Korean. His face was smiling, but he made no effort to hide the impression that he felt deeply insulted by what he had just heard.

I answered his question by shaking my head.

He smiled and placed a hand on my shoulder. The hand that had gripped my shoulder firmly, as if kneading it, then moved to my head, lightly ruffled my hair, and withdrew.

"……"

It was physical contact I hadn't anticipated at all. While this kind of casual contact was frequent with Juhan hyung or Yuni nuna, it had never extended to me before.

Even though we had once been the "lovers on the bed" with each other — if only for a single night — this kind of spontaneous physical contact in everyday life felt more awkward than that one unexpected encounter in bed had. Until now.

Heat rushed to my face as if he had just showered me with passionate kisses in the middle of this event hall. Taking advantage of the moment he turned his upper body toward the gallery director, I raised my arm and rubbed my face as if wiping away sweat. But the air conditioning was running strong enough inside to make the room feel faintly cool.

Shaking his head slowly, as if regarding something highly suspicious, he cast his gaze toward the painting once more.

"Hmm… I'm in the same industry, so I understand. Inflating and packaging a work beyond its actual worth is a sales tactic I use myself — but buying a piece that's obviously going to be worth half its price within a year or two after paying $15,000 for it will only end up casting doubt on the gallery's judgment."

The content of his words was almost cruel, but to be blunt, his tone and expression conveyed no mockery toward the artwork, the artist, or the director who had discovered them. He was simply conveying exactly what he felt, "without any packaging."

Within a few months, I had come to understand his way of speaking to some degree. He never minced words or sugar-coated things, especially when it came to work. There were times he gave instructions to Yuni nuna and Juhan hyung just as directly as he did to me, excluding emotional consideration entirely.

He seemed to believe that if the content of the words was true, packaging the delivery was simply inefficient.

Of course, when I hadn't known him well, that style of speaking was hard to accept. In the normal world, a certain degree of softening was simply politeness.

The gallery director was trying to maintain his composure, but his round face, glistening with oil, was involuntarily contorting.

Unfortunately, I couldn't help but agree with the substance of his words myself.

Fifteen thousand, and not in Hong Kong dollars but in US dollars. No matter how much of an amateur I was, there was no doubt that this painting was not worth that much.

The gallery director, who had approached with a gentle smile and acted the part of the eager flatterer, left the painting without a second glance and moved on to the next booth without even offering a simple farewell. He, too, paid no mind to the man's sudden change of demeanor.

I hurried out of the booth behind him, glancing back one more time.

Though I hadn't meant to criticize someone else's work so harshly, I feared that if I picked up a brush now, I would end up painting something just like that — a painting that couldn't express itself naturally, that denied and fabricated the self.

I was afraid. But I didn't tell him that.

That wasn't the only residue Lovers on the Bed left in me.

Could it have been a coincidence that he had asked for my impression in front of that specific painting and no other? The bluish coldness burning in his eyes bothered me. Lovers on the Bed. If I hadn't misread it, the artist's name was "SEONEW." Seonew. A Korean artist in their twenties. I repeated the name silently to myself, savoring it so I wouldn't forget.

· · · · ·

"Liu-ssi."

Just as we were about to turn into the next booth after crossing a hall where an experimental installation piece — translucent sculptures suspended in the air to visualize the flow of air — was on display, someone called his name in a very cheerful tone.

It was an East Asian man who looked about a head and a half shorter than him, with a sharp and capable impression. He responded quickly to the offered handshake with a business smile.

"He's someone I worked with back in Hong Kong. I'll just say hello briefly, so look around this booth. There should be quite a few pieces you might find interesting."

After reiterating once more that I should definitely stay in this booth and not move elsewhere, he disappeared around the corner with his former colleague. The well-dressed East Asian man, in a sharply tailored tuxedo suit that flowed over his frame, seemed to be leading him toward a group of others who would be pleased to see him.

In any case, this was the city where he had been born and raised, and where he had worked before moving to Seoul. Running into an acquaintance anywhere wasn't strange at all.

I hesitated slightly at the thought of entering the booth alone to look at paintings without him, but a staff member inside gave me courage with a slight smile and a welcoming gesture, as if to say it was perfectly fine to look around at my own pace.

Whether it was a major gallery or not, the booth was quite spacious and there were many visitors. That was actually a relief — it meant the staff didn't have the leisure to pay much attention to me.

Before I had even looked at a few pieces, I immediately understood why he had said there would be works that would catch my interest.

Intensely or palely, overtly or coolly — regardless of the method of expression, the booth was filled with artworks speaking a language I could understand.

"It's a shame it already sold for thirty-five million dollars, isn't it? If only we'd been a little quicker, we could have acquired it."

I turned to the side and saw an unfamiliar face. I managed an awkward smile for the man who had addressed me in a joking tone.

"Ah… you must be staff from one of the galleries attending the fair."

"Yes."

"Where… Seoul. Gallery… Phantom."

The man leaned back to peer at the ID badge hanging around my neck and read out my affiliation aloud. Then he extended his hand for a handshake. Our eye levels were similar, but his hands were much larger than mine. I looked down at his hand for a moment before hesitantly grasping it. The sound of his faint chuckle seemed to see through all my bewilderment and awkwardness. It wasn't mockery.

"This is who I am. I'm affiliated with a gallery in New York, but since I'm originally from Hong Kong, I know this side well too."

The man, holding a champagne glass in one hand, carefully pulled a case from his jacket pocket and handed me a business card. The simple rectangular card, made of art paper, introduced the man's affiliation in English.

The man looked to be of mixed East Asian and Western heritage. His facial structure and hair had a distinctly East Asian quality, but his eyes were a deep blue. Facing that incongruity, I recalled the shock I had felt the first time I saw him. Perhaps this is what a Golden Alpha looks like…

I didn't sense that same imposing presence or unique aura from the man who was casually talking about the painting hanging in front of him while I stood there, but we shared the somewhat broad commonality of being of mixed heritage and having blue eyes.

"Our gallery is hosting a party in the Soho area on Sunday. If you're free, would you care to stop by with your other staff members? It would be great if you could make it. It's a chance for the galleries to connect, and if we're lucky, maybe even an opportunity to make some private travel memories…"

As the man said this, lowering his voice slightly, a somewhat noisy group guided by a staff member crowded toward paintings in another section directly behind him. Turning sharply to avoid them, the man drew in close to me, slightly tilting his chin as he looked up at me strangely from beneath lowered eyelids. We were close enough in height that the distance between us was narrow enough to make me tense — a wrong turn of the head and our noses might brush.

"Alpha? Beta?"

Seeing him up close, his eyes were completely different from the Director's. His weren't that distinct, mineral-like blue, but something more precarious and delicate, as if they might vanish at any moment… like seafoam, or… yes, like a ghost…

"Seo Ihyeon."

At the sound of my name called from behind, I turned around immediately, as though my head had been pulled.

He was striding quickly toward me from the booth entrance. His eyes, which usually seemed so delicate they might disappear at any moment, were now burning fiercely. This was entirely different from the coldness he had displayed in front of Lovers on the Bed.

"Wow… just looking at him, he's a Golden Alpha. If I'd known you were going around with someone like that, I wouldn't have touched you."

Muttering this to himself and shaking his head, the man offered a brief "nice to meet you" and fled the scene.

"What the hell was that."

Before I could reply, he stopped in front of me, seemingly taking the other man's place, and snatched the business card from my hand.

"He seemed to be someone from a gallery in New York… He said there's a party on Sunday and asked if I'd come with the other staff…"

I didn't know why I was making excuses, but his severe expression felt like it was demanding an explanation.

After examining the business card, he glanced in the direction where the previous man had disappeared. He tracked the man's movements, and I tracked his gaze — then suddenly I remembered the question the vanished man had asked.

The man had asked me if I was an Alpha or a Beta. Omega wasn't even an option.

"You're already invited to another party on Sunday. So you won't need this, then."

Before I could even lift my head from nodding in agreement, he had already crumpled the business card in his hand.

Only this man suspected I was an Omega.

"Your meeting with Suki Kim is scheduled for Friday."

"……"

Crumpling the card without throwing it away, he slipped it into his inner jacket pocket and spoke quickly.

"It would have been nice to meet more leisurely on the last day, but since this was arranged on short notice, Friday was the only time I could secure."

"No, it's fine. Even ten minutes… I'm grateful."

He looked down at me silently for a moment, then swept a hand down his face from his forehead and sighed.

"Keep this a secret from the others. If they find out you're meeting Suki Kim, they'll throw a fit demanding to be taken along."

When I nodded, his eyes, fixed on me this time, calmed down a little. He scanned every corner of my face as if checking my safety, then muttered a low curse — the target of which I couldn't discern — and looked away.

The works I saw afterward barely registered. My mind was entirely consumed with the thought of meeting Teacher Suki Kim.

I had decided to come here because of his promise to arrange a meeting with her, but until this moment it hadn't felt real. Now, with the excitement finally settling into something tangible, I felt as though my feet were hovering an inch above the floor.

He struck me as extraordinary all over again. Not just his ability to arrange a meeting with Teacher Suki Kim — but that tenacity, that commitment, to willingly endure such a bothersome process just to get me to paint. That steadfastness itself was astonishing.

He had confidence in me, a complete stranger — but it was a different kind of conviction than the confidence Yeehan hyung's grandfather had in hyung's life, or Mr. Lim had in Morae nuna's.

Could he really trust his own instincts that much? Even knowing that what I could produce right now would likely be nothing more than a heavily ornamented imitation — just like the work of the artist "Seonew"?

After walking around the venue once, he returned to our booth. He seemed quite thirsty and immediately poured himself a full glass of champagne and downed it. Then he picked up a few nuts, tossed them into his mouth like popcorn, and promptly pushed the dish far away.

"Ah, someone please clear this away. I don't even like these, but if they're in front of me, I keep eating them."

"I brought them to snack on when I get sleepy. Unlike other booths, our booth spent three hours doing hard labor unwrapping bubble wrap."

"Hmm, as far as I know, unlike all other booths, a certain booth is staying at Hotel F."

"Damn it. I have nothing to say to that."

Trading jokes with Juhan hyung, he had already returned to his usual self.

· · · · ·

Without realizing how many times I had checked my phone, I let out a long breath and set it down beside me. To distract myself even slightly, I got out of bed and walked over to the floor-to-ceiling window.

From Tsim Sha Tsui at the western tip of the peninsula to Kowloon Bay in the east, the view spread out before me without obstruction.

When people talk about the Hong Kong night view, the panorama overlooking the entire city from Victoria Peak is generally the most famous, followed by the view of the main island — densely packed with high-rises — seen from the peninsula side. Nuna and hyung had told me as much, but for me, the scenery right before my eyes was more than enough.

The buildings clustered so close to the harbor, and the lights illuminating the edge of the port, were different from the harbor view I used to see from the slope near my grandfather's house — and different, too, from the Seoul nightscape I had looked down upon from the wooden platform of my rooftop room.

It feels like proof that I have come to a place incredibly far away — a place entirely unplanned in my life until now — and that I'm being exposed to a completely unfamiliar situation.

This room was the same. Even after staying here for two nights, it still felt strange and awkward, as if I had been invited into someone else's dream.

Over the past few months, my environment had changed multiple times, the people around me had shifted, and unexpected events and experiences had piled up… and now I had drifted all the way to this unfamiliar city. I couldn't believe that entire journey was actually my past. It felt as unreal as the Hong Kong night view seen through thick glass.

—♬

I turned around.

Unlike usual, my phone — set to ring — was emitting light from the bed, playing a monotonous melody. My heart vibrated in response, telling me this was not someone else's dream. Goosebumps prickled all over my body, from my back down through my armpits and sides. Perhaps the only truly vivid sense of reality was the reaction my own body was showing.

At least in this moment, even if it were a dream, it was my dream.

"…Yes."

[Come downstairs. I'm at the main entrance.]

His voice sounded just like it always did.

That was the entirety of their conversation.

After taking a deep breath, I left the room.

I quickly strode across the elegant hallway adorned with beige marble, through the elevator hall, and across the grand lobby where well-dressed people were coming and going — brushing down my exposed arms beneath my short sleeves.

Stopping in front of the main entrance, I scanned left and right, looking for him or his car, when one of the doormen approached and guided me: "Liu-ssi is waiting."

Waiting near the hotel entrance was a different car from the one I had taken from the airport to the hotel. It was much smaller, but it was also a luxury vehicle.

He was sitting in the back seat, which the doorman opened for me. He, in the inner seat, tilted his head slightly as if to say, get in quickly. Once I had awkwardly settled in, the doorman closed the door, and the car — waiting with its hazard lights on — began to move smoothly. Unlike the Phantom he had driven himself last time, this car had the steering wheel on the right side to suit Hong Kong's road conditions, and a middle-aged man I didn't recognize was behind the wheel.

"We'll end up drinking with those guys anyway. This is the person who will be driving us today."

"Yes…"

He must have noticed my uneasy mood, because he introduced me to the driver. I greeted him briefly in English, and the driver — who had a gentle impression — turned slightly and acknowledged me with a quiet nod.

Yuni nuna and Juhan hyung had already gotten ready and gone out, determined to enjoy Hong Kong's Friday night. I had told them I would rest a bit longer at the hotel and contact them later. His plan was for me to meet up with the two of them after seeing Teacher Suki Kim.

"Did you eat anything in your room?"

Perhaps finding my hesitant manner while greeting the driver amusing, he let out a soft chuckle and asked. He was fiddling with a camera — not very large, the kind that fits perfectly in the palm of a hand.

He had told us to use room service for anything we needed during our stay, but I wasn't in a state to swallow food. I didn't even feel hungry. I fiddled with the zipper of the bag I had set down beside my thigh and shook my head.

"There's no need to be so nervous. She'll put you at ease."

His words were reassuring, and I was grateful for them. I nodded slowly. His gaze lingered on my hand, still fidgeting with the zipper. It was the kind of look that suggested he might reach over and hold my hand to calm me down… though that didn't actually happen.

The car passed the hotel entrance and a large shopping mall, then began to climb the narrow incline into the Soho district. It was a street I had long wanted to visit, but right now I couldn't take it in at all.

"When you meet her… what would you like to do?"

"Ah…"

I turned my gaze, which had been drifting aimlessly out the window, toward him. The words I managed after that hollow little sigh weren't very coherent.

"Should I have thought about what I wanted to say beforehand?"

He had been leaning his elbow on the window ledge, his head resting against it as he looked over at me; he shook his head and sat up straight.

"No, it won't matter. Like I said before, she's someone who puts people at ease. Unlike me. Setting aside prejudice, it's genuinely quite a rare personality for an artist."

As he spoke, he pulled a pack of cigarettes from the drawer in the armrest between them. Then, after glancing out the window, he put the cigarettes back in their place and instead slung the camera's long strap around his neck.

The car was slowing on the bustling streets of Soho.

Friday night in Soho, with its mix of people from various races, was alive with music spilling out of numerous pubs and the laughter and shouts of people already in high spirits.

We got out in front of a corner building wedged between a steep incline and the building across the street. A café with a small terrace occupied the first floor, where a group of about five — a mix of Westerners and Asians — were cheerfully chatting over bottled beers at a terrace table.

"This way, please."

As I wondered whether we were really going to meet the artist in a place like this, he stepped ahead toward the stairs leading to the second floor. Instead of calling anyone, he unlocked the door lock at the stair entrance himself. Unlike the aged and worn exterior typical of Soho buildings, the interior was quite modern and minimalist.

I climbed the stairs — white enough to make me careful where I stepped — and arrived at a white door. The room I followed him into was entirely white. White tile floor, a white ceiling, white walls. In the very center sat a white table and chairs, placed in silence.

It brought back memories of my first time stepping into Phantom. But this was far from the strictness that demanded cleanliness and purity, insisting that nothing should be sullied even a little.

Just a few steps away the entire street was bustling, yet this space seemed filled with the bright light of midday. It was a white that reminded me of the warm, bright light that used to illuminate the living room of the old apartment where I lived with my mother and father.

"This is…"

"Suki Kim's studio."

"…"

"Sit and wait a moment. She'll be out soon."

I had expected to meet her at some external location he had arranged — a restaurant or somewhere — but I never imagined being permitted inside the studio of an artist like her.

Just the realization that I was in Teacher's studio was making my palms damp, yet he, having delivered this bombshell, calmly disappeared down the corridor behind him.

He told me to sit, but I only set my bag down on the table and remained perfectly still, staring in the direction he had vanished.

The sound of a door opening and closing, the footsteps of two people, the murmur of everyday conversation — someone lightly complaining and making excuses about something — grew closer. Then, at the end of the corridor, Teacher appeared with him.

"Welcome. It's a pleasure to meet you."

She's taller than I expected from her photos… That was the only thought I could manage. I couldn't believe the situation, and I couldn't tear my eyes away until she stepped forward and offered her hand. Afraid I had seemed rude, I quickly lowered my gaze and took the hand she extended.

It was a thin, gaunt, neat, and warm hand.

"I've heard about you from Awi and have been looking forward to meeting you."

Gesturing toward him standing a step behind her as she said this, Teacher then turned her whole upper body to look at him.

"Ah, and in Korea you go by Kun, don't you?"

He shrugged, thrusting his hands into his jeans pockets, as if what he was called didn't matter much either way. They seemed far more familiar with each other than I had anticipated.

"In Hong Kong, we make nicknames by taking one character from a name and putting 'A' in front of it."

That was Teacher's explanation as she turned back to look at me.

A small curiosity of mine had been unexpectedly answered.

Most people called him "Kun," but I had remembered Shushu using a different name at the VIP event. It was definitely "Awi."

If they had spent their student days together in Hong Kong, it wouldn't be strange for her to call him by his Hong Kong nickname. It might not be a term reserved to signal a special relationship — like a nickname between lovers or those in a similar position.

"The art fair must be tough — so hectic. You've worked hard."

Teacher lightly squeezed my arm as if in encouragement. The atmosphere was familiar, like people who had always chatted this way in this place. I sensed none of the wariness, sensitivity, or peculiar eccentricity sometimes seen in major artists.

"Oh, and Shushu's work is getting better and better, isn't it? I read an article in one of the art magazines here covering the 'Body to Soul' exhibition."

"I finalized an exhibition contract with a gallery in Chicago just today. All the Phantom-owned Shushu works we brought to the fair are heading straight to Chicago. Once they're up in Chicago, sales will follow — it's only a matter of time."

He, who had been quietly fiddling with the camera hanging around his neck and staying somewhat withdrawn from the conversation, leaned casually against the table as he spoke. His tone wasn't exactly excited, but he made no attempt to hide the faint smile at the corner of his lips.

Perhaps it was the collared T-shirt, jeans, and loafers — he looked significantly more casual and younger today than usual. His relaxed posture compared to when he wore a suit, and the small camera around his neck — which looked like a toy next to his frame — also contributed to that impression.

"You sound quite confident."

Teacher gave me a playful look, as if teasing him.

"The work is developing an increasingly strong Eastern influence, so they'll probably go wild for it over there. If we can get a brief appearance at the opening event, it'll generate even more buzz. A few interviews would be even better."

His comments were unexpected.

I knew he was a dealer who couldn't judge a work purely on aesthetic value, and as an owner he sometimes showed a frighteningly cold, businesslike streak when it came to marketing. But for some reason, I had thought Shushu would be the exception.

I knew that generating buzz through the artist's attractive appearance or factors outside the work was merely a tactic to boost Shushu's reputation and artistic value — it didn't mean he treated Shushu's art as merely a means to an end. There was no doubt that he genuinely valued Shushu's art. Nevertheless, his remarks surprised me.

"Oh my — your marketing is still as aggressive as ever."

This time, Teacher blinked her eyes wide and tilted her head slightly, as if seeking my agreement. I could sense she didn't fully approve of his approach, but she didn't voice any stronger opposition.

"We can't just keep standing here… I'm not much of a talker, so I don't have anything particularly good to say. If you're all right with it, would you like to take a slow look around my studio?"

Clapping her hands together as if calling for attention, Teacher made the suggestion. At the unexpected offer I instinctively looked for him with my eyes. He nodded, signaling it was fine.

"…It would be an honor."

"No need to call it an honor."

Teacher smiled, patting my shoulder.

Leaving him in the hall — where neither a potted plant nor a single painting was displayed — Teacher and I headed down the corridor from which she and he had just emerged. My heart was throbbing with so much tension and trembling it felt numb, but Teacher opened the studio door without hesitation, as if welcoming a long-awaited friend.

The studio was entirely white, just like the hall, but as a space where paintings were made, traces of hands and ink had naturally settled in every corner.

I might not know much about art history or the lineage of painters, but Teacher was another matter.

Having passed through various styles over the course of a long career, Teacher had been devoted solely to traditional Eastern painting using only ink for about three years now. Because of that, a heavy scent of ink permeated the studio.

It was difficult to gauge what it meant to be granted access to the studio of a professional painter — and one recognized as a master, no less. Yet I still remembered the jealous sense of alienation that the studio my parents had shared used to evoke in me as a child.

That space — where my mother drew her comics and my father painted with oils — felt like a secret realm that only the two of them could share and fully understand each other within.

In the living room or at the dining table, my parents were my parents, and I could feel them close — but the moment they stepped into the studio, I felt excluded from their world, a sensation that used to make me anxious as a child.

That place was entirely theirs, and it meant more than just a physical space.

The meaning a studio holds might differ for every artist, but for painters who pour themselves into their work, it must, at the very least, be a place where they confront themselves. The very act of stepping into Teacher's inner sanctum — a place so private that calling it merely private felt insufficient — was already something special.

The geographical sense of being in Hong Kong had also become meaningless. Come to think of it, the clamor of the busy streets outside was being perfectly blocked out.

"There's not much to see, really. I don't work with a wide variety of materials, so… this is just how I work."

"Coffee?" Teacher asked, offering me a mug. I thanked her and accepted the cup.

"Maybe I should have made it iced? When I drink iced coffee at this temperature, my body temperature drops — so I always drink it warm."

"No, thank you. I'll enjoy it just like this."

The scent of coffee mingled with the lingering aroma of ink in the room, where the ceiling air conditioner ran softly. Taking a sip, I cautiously continued to look around the space.

Whether the finished works were stored in another room, the only paintings visible were the large landscape currently in progress and a single portrait hanging on the wall opposite it.

Even if a dragon wraps its body around a mountain and hides its head, it is still a dragon.

Despite being unfinished, Teacher's landscape painting was overwhelming. It possessed the bold spirit that only a master who had spent a lifetime dissolving their own bone and flesh into their art could convey without pretense or boasting — and simultaneously, a tolerant magnanimity vast enough to embrace the entire world. I was so struck that goosebumps rose across my entire body the moment I stepped into the room.

Strangely, however, what truly captured my attention now was the painting on the wall above the sofa opposite.

It was a portrait rendered in colored ink, appearing almost like a watercolor, with soft, blurred lines between the strokes, giving it a childlike innocence. Yet it was unmistakably Teacher's work.

"Do you like it?"

Noticing my gaze, Teacher turned, looked at the painting, and asked. I nodded, holding the mug with both hands to feel the warmth of the coffee.

"I thought I knew almost all of your works… but I've never seen this one before."

My lips trembled slightly as I answered.

Teacher placed the mug on the table in front of the sofa and took the painting off the wall. It was roughly 8-cut in size — not very large.

"Take this painting."

"……"

I was too surprised to react. I stared at Teacher with wide eyes.

"Ah, no. Absolutely not. I couldn't possibly accept that."

Coming to my senses, I set the mug on the table and waved my hands in emphatic refusal. Involuntarily, the monetary value of Teacher's artwork flashed through my mind. Though I hated to think of it that way, I couldn't accept such an expensive gift.

Teacher approached the windowsill shelf, carrying the painting, and spoke.

"Ihyeon-ssi, you're not very good with words either, are you?"

"……"

The question, coming from an unexpected direction, brought my feet to a stop. Teacher wasn't talking about common eloquence or social skills. This was about knowing what language was most comfortable for me — something a person meeting me for the first time wouldn't know.

"I'm the same way. So, please accept this as a letter, or a card, from me to you."

My open mouth just hung there, wordless.

"But, I really couldn't…"

I mumbled, arms hanging at my sides. Now that I wasn't painting, I felt even less deserving of that piece.

Teacher placed the painting on the shelf and turned toward me.

"That painting."

"……"

"Alienation was a comfort to Awi."

"……"

Once, because Teacher remembered Alienation.

And again, because the meaning that painting held for him was comfort.

Teacher's brief sentence made me stagger.

Did he like that painting, Alienation? "That night," I had asked him.

His answer came as he climbed onto the bed: "Shall I make you forget everything?"

I didn't refuse him, and at the peak of a pleasure that felt like my muddled mind was being stirred, I was able — just as he promised — to forget everything and sink into a deep sleep.

If that deep rest was the answer he had intended to give me, then I suppose I could take it to mean that he liked the painting. But that was only my speculation.

I never expected to hear the precise answer conveyed through words — here, through Teacher.

"Awi grew up seeing many excellent works, and while he owns pieces valuable both as a gallery owner and as a private collector, the work that has shaken him the most — perhaps — was Alienation."

Leaning against the shelf behind her, Teacher crossed her arms as if to comfort herself.

"When Alienation was released into the world as the cover for a famous author's Hong Kong edition novel, Awi was so displeased at having to share that painting with others, even in that form… He showed such obsession — he wanted the painting to exist only for himself."

These were unbelievable stories. For me, who had already had to endure considerable tension just at the prospect of meeting Teacher… these were beyond what I could handle. Yet I couldn't stop listening.

"Ihyeon-ssi appealed to the world through his emotions, and people who spoke the same language understood and responded. Awi isn't a painter, but he is more sensitive to the language within paintings than anyone else. That's probably why he works in the gallery business now — even though he sometimes pretends to judge art only by its economic value."

At that point, Teacher let out a faint chuckle. That loose smile seemed to overlap with the set of someone else's mouth.

Teacher's gaze, which had been sweeping diagonally across the floor, returned to me.

"Ihyeon-ssi's painting functioned, at least for one person, as a language they could understand. It offered a kind of empathy — that he wasn't the only one feeling alienation for a non-universal reason, a reason that no one — not even family, not even parents — could provide… Empathy for alienation."

Empathy for alienation.

That was the emotion I had felt in Teacher Suki Kim's critique.

Under two parents who maintained a good relationship and were understanding, I was supposed to be a perfectly happy child. Many people around me, even my friends, spoke as though that were my obligation.

That's not to say I didn't love them. On the contrary, they were the most precious to me, and I loved them — and for someone like me, who wasn't very outgoing, they were like my closest friends, even before the accident.

I was happy. It just wasn't the perfect happiness that people seemed to demand of me. I don't know if perfect happiness even exists, or what form it might take if it does.

For my mother, my father was the priority; for my father, my mother was. They absolutely needed each other to live as themselves. Sometimes, I simply envied friends who had parents who lived for their children. Very rarely.

There was a bond between them that I could never wedge myself into. And perhaps… that was the most important element in their lives. They spoke the same language, and they were the only two people in the world who spoke it.

No one can understand the alienation felt for such a non-universal reason. That's why I painted it.

Through that painting, someone other than Teacher shared those same feelings… and the fact that it was him — Liu Weikun, and no one else — suddenly felt like the final destination waiting at the end of my entire journey.

For a reason I couldn't quite articulate, a warm dampness welled up behind my eyes. I didn't know. At this moment, I could only call it an unknown reason. I clenched my fists, putting tension into my dangling arms, holding the tears back firmly. Showing emotion isn't necessarily weakness, but I didn't want to be sentimental in this moment.

Teacher unlinked her arms, straightened up from the shelf, and walked toward me. Then, placing both hands on my shoulders, she smiled and looked deeply into my face.

"Please accept this as a token of my gratitude."

Could Teacher be his mother?

Based on the atmosphere between the two of them, I had a suspicion, and as I listened to Teacher speak, that suspicion grew closer to certainty. It seemed unlikely that anyone other than family or a parent would know about his sense of alienation — a feeling that even his own family or parents couldn't fully empathize with. He wasn't the type to share his solitude with others.

Like a mentor from my childhood, Teacher gently cupped my cheek once, then let go, returning to the shelf to begin wrapping the painting.

"A very long time ago… there was something I thought was more important than painting. I believed I had to set painting aside for its sake, and so I didn't touch my brushes for about two years. When I stopped painting, a slump naturally followed. This piece was made at the end of that slump — it's something like a diary entry I never intended to show the world."

As Teacher wrapped the painting in paper with a texture similar to hanji and then tied it with twine, her hands slowed for a moment. She looked up at the window, which framed the Hong Kong cityscape horizontally like a long picture frame along the wall.

"I thought something inside me had died, and that was why I could no longer paint… but then one day, I thought: perhaps I am the one who died — because I had stopped painting."

Teacher, having tied the twine in a tight knot, stood before me again with the painting. She held it out and smiled.

"Not being able to truly be myself without going through painting… that must be what it means."

She apologized for not having more time to spare, but the sheer volume of what I had seen, heard, and felt within that brief period — barely thirty minutes in total — had already overflowed far beyond what I had expected or prepared myself for.

After a brief hug and saying goodbye to Teacher, when I stepped out onto the noisy street with him, I felt dazed, as if I had passed through some boundary separating dimensions. My senses couldn't keep up with the speed of the experience. It was similar to the state I had been in after waking up in his bed following the hyperventilation.

"Are you all right?"

I slowly raised my head at the sound of his voice. There were eyes looking down at me with concern from a spot slightly higher than mine. The fact that he was looking at me with such worry felt striking all over again.

No — it wasn't something new to be surprised about.

He was the one who had steadied me when I was hyperventilating and couldn't regain my senses — in a moment I don't even remember. When I finally regained my composure and came out of his bedroom back into the living room, the painting was already gone. He must have removed it intentionally, thinking it might be the cause of the episode. According to Teacher, he had removed a painting he cherished so much he was obsessively attached to it.

I had already known long ago that the initial hostility and defensiveness he displayed weren't his consistent, stubborn way of dealing with others. Even with Phantom's members or Inwu hyung, there were times he was cold — but that wasn't the whole story either.

In what way had I clung to him? How had he soothed, managed, changed my clothes, and laid me in bed — a person desperately clinging to him as if dying, even knowing they wouldn't die?

What was his alienation? What kind of alienation had made him empathize so deeply with Alienation?

I had thought that after meeting Teacher, I would only be able to think of her — but unexpectedly, I could only think of him.

"You must have expended a lot of energy… If you want to rest, I can take you back to the hotel. I'll make up some excuse for you to those two."

He was right. Though I hadn't physically struggled with Teacher, I felt completely drained, as if all the moisture had been wrung from my body.

But, why? I didn't want to leave him.

Even though I felt weak, excitement was building at the same time. Even if I went back to the hotel, it was obvious I wouldn't be able to sleep easily. I looked straight into his eyes and shook my head.

Why? A flicker of something like bewilderment crossed his eyes as he looked at me. Not the bewilderment of being troubled that I wasn't returning to the hotel. It was the look of someone unable to control themselves and revealing emotion — just like when he crumpled up the business card he had taken from me. However, it didn't last long.

"All right, then. Let's get in the car."

He didn't try to persuade me further.

For a moment he looked as if he were dismantling himself; then he quickly averted his gaze and brushed past me. He stood with the back door open, urging me with his eyes to get in. I followed the faint scent that briefly bloomed from his shoulder and climbed into the car.

· · · · ·

It was a local restaurant with a bright sign in bold golden Chinese characters.

As I stepped inside with him, several people were finishing late meals at tables lined along a narrow corridor to the right. Contrary to the grandeur of the sign, the interior décor was simple and welcoming. It was the kind of casual Hong Kong eatery where one could fill up without feeling out of place.

Deeper inside, Yuni nuna and Juhan were seated at a corner table placed at a diamond angle — an attempt, it seemed, at a bit of style. Unconsciously, my face brightened. It wasn't as though I had been wandering alone in an unfamiliar place, but even just reuniting after a few hours apart in a strange city brought an immediate warmth to seeing their familiar faces.

"Oh? What's this? Why are you two coming in together?"

Juhan hyung, who had been sitting facing the corridor, was the first to raise his hand and acknowledge us. Both of them looked more energized than usual, as one would expect from people who had been gearing up for a Hong Kong Friday night.

"He said his condition had improved, so I stopped by the hotel and brought him along."

He answered, perching on a worn wooden chair without a backrest. Since nuna and Juhan were sitting across from each other at the square table, he and I took seats opposite one another as well.

"Right, you were really looking forward to seeing Soho. Can't miss Soho on a Friday night."

I smiled back at Juhan hyung, who playfully tapped my back and grinned. I felt a little self-conscious hearing that I had been looking forward to Soho in front of him, but it was true.

"It was so cute — watching someone who doesn't really express what he wants doing all this research on his phone."

Yuni nuna joined in, pinching my cheek gently and giggling. This time I was even more conscious of him. I really didn't want him to know just how excitedly I had been looking forward to it, like a child.

Pretending not to notice his gaze from across the table — his expression seemed to ask, Is that so? — I rubbed the spot nuna had pinched with my palm, even though it didn't hurt.

"Let's order something too. I haven't had dinner yet either."

Before I could respond, he called over a staff member and, quite naturally, conversed in fluent Cantonese. It seemed to be a familiar restaurant, as he ordered without even looking at the menu.

It was strange seeing him speak Cantonese; he seemed like a slightly different person. I had heard him use several languages on the phone at Phantom, but watching him converse with a local right in front of me was an entirely different experience.

"The wontons are soft — easy to eat."

Suddenly his gaze shifted toward me. I had been staring blankly at him and startled, I looked over at Yuni nuna sitting beside me for no reason.

I still had no appetite to speak of, but thinking he might have been considerate because I hadn't eaten anything at the hotel, I belatedly nodded.

"Director, please order one more bowl of wonton noodles for me."

Juhan hyung called out urgently as he lifted the last remaining mouthful of noodles.

"I'll have milk tea."

This time, it was Yuni nuna's request. He looked back and forth between the two, then glanced down at the stack of empty bowls on the table, and let out a quiet sigh.

"Of course — we must treat our staff who work so hard day and night."

After the server took the empty bowls and left the table, he adjusted his posture, crossing his legs, and suddenly looked at nuna with narrowed eyes.

"Why. Why are you looking at me with that ominous smile again?"

Nuna was smiling with a playful expression, the straw from her nearly-finished milk tea between her lips.

"Honestly, I like Hong Kong so much I could live here — but I don't find the Cantonese language all that appealing as a language."

"……"

"But when the Director speaks Cantonese, it's kind of sexy. Maybe it's because it's a side of him I don't usually see."

A few old Hong Kong movies were the entirety of my impressions of Cantonese and Hong Kong, but if I recalled correctly, the characters in those films exchanged boisterous conversations with rather strong accents. His Cantonese, however, was calm and relaxed. I wanted to hear more of this unfamiliar language as spoken in his slightly husky, low voice. Perhaps that truly was… sexiness. Many people would probably think so.

"The content is a compliment, but why does your smile feel so ominous?"

"It's just funny to me that I'm finding the Director sexy all of a sudden."

Still gnawing on the end of her straw, nuna kept grinning. There was no sexual connotation in her use of the word "sexy." It was that sensation of suddenly discovering objective attractiveness in someone one usually perceives like family. He accepted the compliment without attaching any weight to it. Perhaps because it was so familiar a compliment to receive.

Shaking his head as if he couldn't help it, he lifted the camera hanging around his neck and snapped a picture of nuna's mischievous smile. Just as in his garden, nuna showed not the slightest awkwardness at having a camera suddenly pointed at her.

"Why did you buy so much again?"

He looked down to check the photo on the screen, then noticed something under the table and spoke in surprise.

"Old Future new arrivals. We cleared them out again."

Though I had glimpsed them when I sat down, looking properly now, there were easily over ten shopping bags hidden beneath the gaudy floral tablecloth. It seemed that during their precious, rare free time, the two of them had been diligently moving around for Old Future rather than eating, drinking, or spending time on themselves.

"Seriously, you two are incredible. Where on earth does that energy come from? Are you taking some kind of tonic?"

At his genuinely surprised expression, Yuni nuna and Juhan burst out laughing.

Under the bright fluorescent lights, surrounded by familiar faces, their conversation, and the rich smell of food, my hazy senses slowly began to regain a sense of reality.

"We came fully prepared today to properly set up our Seo Ihyeon…"

Nuna set down her milk tea and dug into one of the shopping bags under the table, pulling out a T-shirt. It was a striped knit tee. She held it up under my chin to see if it suited me, but I grabbed her hand.

"Nuna, I… I really can't accept this."

"Hey, who said it's free? You can pay for it when it gets updated on Old Future."

That was Juhan hyung, who had just drained the last of his wonton noodle soup.

"Yeah, we're forcing a sale here. So don't refuse, Ihyeon."

Nuna pulled my hand away. I knew they were saying this on purpose to make me feel more comfortable. Setting aside whether I paid or not, I was simply grateful that they had thought of me even while so tired and busy.

"The moment I saw it, I knew it was yours. I couldn't not buy it."

This time, I couldn't refuse as nuna held the top up to my chest again.

The loosely woven knit was oversized, with a relaxed neckline and a generally drooping silhouette. While someone like Juhan hyung might naturally pull it off, it felt a bit too fashionable for me — but I trusted nuna's taste implicitly.

"It's pretty… but won't it be a little hot?"

He raised the camera to eye level and spoke. I subtly turned my head toward nuna, worried the lens might be pointing my way.

"It's fine everywhere because the AC is always blasting. And it's thinner than you think, and the weave is loose, so air flows right through. Look."

Nuna threaded her fingers between the knots. It wasn't sheer enough to see straight through, but the weave was loose enough to glimpse the inside if you looked closely.

"Hmm… isn't it a little revealing?"

"……"

Unconsciously my gaze shifted toward him, and click — the shutter snapped in that instant. Whether it was from shyness at being unfamiliar with cameras, or perhaps because of his remark about it being revealing, my ears instantly grew hot.

Juhan hyung, who had finished his entire bowl of noodles, tossed the last fish ball into his mouth as if completely uninterested in the situation, while nuna stared at him in pointed silence.

"Why are you like that again?"

"You think things like that while looking at Ihyeon? What an animal."

While criticizing him with an aggrieved expression, nuna spread out the knit top and covered my face with it. I resented my own immaturity for getting flustered so easily over such a light, meaningless tease. I wanted to handle myself and the situation with more skill and composure, but all I could manage as my best defense was to shut my mouth.

The newly ordered food arrived and spread across the table, and the topic shifted with it.

"Director, you brought the driver, right? After we finish eating, could you call the car for a moment when we leave? We need to load this into the vehicle before we head out."

Slicing through his newly served wonton noodles with his teeth, Juhan hyung looked up at him. In Seoul, he always seemed to drive himself, but here in Hong Kong, riding in a car driven by someone else appeared to be common.

"Yes, understood. Kwon Juhan."

He tapped Juhan hyung's forehead lightly with the blunt end of a wooden chopstick, then picked up a piece of dim sum from the center of the table and casually placed it on my plate, his eyes and mouth still fixed on Juhan.

"The condition is that you're back at the hotel by midnight, no exceptions. There are still two days left for the fair."

"Ah, of course. Why are you acting like a rookie? We don't have time, so we need to get drunk first. Starting with tequila for the first round."

· · · · ·

The intersection where traffic descending from the park famous for its monkeys met vehicles coming up from the main thoroughfare in Central via Ice House Street, and cars that had passed through Soho along Hollywood Road, was overflowing with people.

After leaving the restaurant, we had drunk tequila at a bar for about an hour, and now we were wandering through the crowds on Soho's streets, searching for a suitable pub for the second round.

While I drank three or four shots of tequila and the other three drank roughly double that, the crowd had swelled so much that not a single four-person table was available anywhere we looked.

I didn't feel bored at all, distracted as I was by the exotic scenery and the sheer variety of people.

Signs hanging over the streets in different languages and styles than those in Seoul, narrow and somewhat shabby buildings each seemingly carrying their own history and stories, luxury cars lined up on roads that felt impossibly cramped due to early modernization efforts — all of it contrasting with the city's vibrancy and further emphasized by the angular, retro red taxis. People drinking beer and chatting with their companions right on the street, others swaying to the rhythm in the middle of the road to music spilling out from pubs and clubs…

Everywhere my gaze landed was filled with unfamiliarity and life.

Perhaps it was because I'd had three or four shots of tequila in a place that felt less like a bar and more like a club — my heart was beating at a different rhythm than usual. My chest felt light, and I kept breaking into involuntary smiles, grinning whenever I caught hyung's or nuna's eye.

It wasn't just us; everyone passing by felt the same way. There wasn't a single serious or gloomy face in sight. Surely everyone carried their own worries and burdens about daily life underneath, but in this time and place, it seemed as though everyone had agreed to temporarily numb their awareness of those problems.

Truthfully, a flashy street packed with people and noise like this didn't suit me. If I had to come and go to a place like this every day, I wouldn't be confident at all. But here, I was an observer, not a resident. Someone who would taste a foreign culture briefly before returning to their original place.

This identity as an outsider — knowing that my real life existed separately somewhere else — actually provided the emotional foundation that allowed me to blend into this space without feeling uncomfortable. Perhaps that was what people called the charm of travel, or maybe the thrill of stepping outside the norm.

Normally, after leaving Teacher Suki Kim's studio, I would have tried to process the shock by quietly secluding myself in my hotel room to replay the conversation and my feelings. But right now, I was suspending that process and following an impulse.

I wanted to be wherever he was.

I wanted to talk to him about the feeling of alienation, but even if I couldn't, I simply wanted to be with him. And I moved simply because I wanted to. Whatever others might think, for me, that very process was already a deviation from my usual path.

Wherever that led, I felt it would be better than the version of me who was afraid of making choices and moving.

It had been that way from the start.

When I was with him, my composure would scatter, my emotions would twist and surge, and sharp edges would suddenly emerge. Now… I wanted to expose myself to that kind of stimulation even more. I wanted change now, and he was someone who drew unexpected sides out of me.

As we passed the entrance to a pub next to a hamburger joint for the third time, we managed to time it perfectly with a group that was just getting up, and we finally secured a table.

We took the outermost seat facing the street, a spot where the entire folding door was wide open and we could fully take in the atmosphere outside. We were lucky.

"What is it, Seo Ihyeon? Are you actually drunk?"

Nuna bent backward, laughing at me as I fumbled and couldn't hop onto the high stool in one go. Watching her, I burst out laughing too. We were all a little strange right now. Well… except for one person.

"Be careful. The stools are high — if you fall, you could get seriously hurt. I've seen plenty of people break their noses drinking in places like this."

He, already settled in, firmly gripped my left arm as if to steady me. Leaning on his arm, I was able to finally perch onto the stool.

He had drunk far more than I had, yet seemed perfectly fine. Although he was matching nuna and hyung's energy appropriately, I couldn't sense any intoxication in his face or voice. I had wanted to see him a little drunk, but given that he and I had started drinking together, it seemed impossible to see him tipsy before me.

Without even sitting down, nuna and hyung were already back to dancing next to the table, beer bottles in hand, blending in with the people on the floor. Foreigners nearby burst out laughing at Juhan hyung's comical gestures mixed in with his dancing, aiming their phone cameras at him. His sociability was remarkable, just as at the bar earlier.

Leaving the two of them — unlikely to sit anytime soon — to their own devices, he ordered drinks and recommended a Brooklyn beer, saying it would suit me well.

"It seems like there's nothing the Director doesn't know."

He suddenly turned to look at me, raising his eyebrows with an expression asking what I meant by that.

At the tall, narrow round table, he and I were sitting side by side across from the seats where nuna and hyung had tossed their bags. In truth, there was almost no space between him and me. It was difficult to shift my posture even slightly without our knees or upper thighs brushing against each other.

I let out a soft laugh, thinking the comment sounded quite random even to me.

"No, I don't."

I shook my head and rested my elbows on the table.

"It seems like there's nothing you don't know." That sounded like something a five or six-year-old would say while looking up at a middle schooler. I had no desire for him to think of me as a kid — so why had I said it?

The beer, served in a transparent plastic cup, arrived quickly, and Yuni nuna and Juhan hyung, spotting it, returned to the table. After another toast — I had long since lost count — we drank. The beer he had chosen was easy and smooth to drink, with a slight sweetness following its bitterness.

Perhaps because they had been dancing, nuna and hyung emptied their glasses almost instantly. Already somewhat floaty from the high proof of the tequila, I still kept bringing the beer glass to my lips, driven by an impulse to get even more intoxicated.

"You guys are the gallery staff from Seoul, right?"

A group passing in front of our table stopped, their faces lighting up with recognition, and called out to us. They seemed to be staff from another gallery attending the fair.

Yuni nuna and Juhan hyung, who had been sitting with their backs to the street, both turned around and exchanged loud high-fives with the group, as if running into old friends.

"We remember you because your staff's style is so distinctive. You look amazing even on your day off!"

"Ah… thanks for the compliment, but aren't you recognizing us because of our boss's looks, not ours?"

Juhan hyung pointed at him and asked playfully.

"I can't exactly say no to that."

Laughter erupted from both sides.

"Ah, what was it again… Gallery… Ghost?"

The most cheerful-looking man among them scratched his beard with his index finger.

"It's Phantom. Gallery Phantom."

"Oh, Phantom! My apologies. I remembered it had a similar meaning."

"That's pretty close."

Yuni nuna patted the bearded man on the back as if to encourage him.

They mentioned with quiet pride that they were attending the fair for the first time with about twenty pieces and had already, luckily, sold out. The three friends, who had each majored in different art genres and were jointly running a small gallery in Amsterdam, seemed to hit it off particularly well with Yuni nuna.

At someone's suggestion to take a commemorative photo, the group took a selfie together on one of their phones, followed by another taken with his camera. He stood up, moved out into the street himself, and took a shot capturing the three of us and their group of three.

While nuna and hyung exchanged SNS handles with them after the photo session, he leaned against the railing between the sidewalk and the road, smoking and looking this way. Letting their lively conversation drift past me, I kept sneaking glances at him through the gaps between their arms and shoulders.

"Excuse me."

I flinched and leaned back slightly as a face suddenly intruded into my line of sight. The cheerful bearded man pulled one of his colleagues over and put an arm around his neck. He was a cute-looking guy with distinctive freckles. Around my age, perhaps?

"Actually, this guy fell for you at first sight when he saw you at the event. He spotted you just now as you passed and recognized you! Could you share your SNS account if you have one?"

The freckled man seemed a little shy, but he didn't try to stop his colleague or deny what had been said.

My expression stiffened slightly as I searched for the right words in this sudden situation.

In the world I had belonged to until now — where Betas were the majority — most people were uncomfortable not only with same-sex relationships between Betas but also with the very existence of Alphas and Omegas. This was an unfamiliar scenario for me.

Whether it was a characteristic of Hong Kong itself, or a common trait of societies with a high ratio of Alphas and Omegas, both the man at the VIP preview and this man now were expressing interest in me — a man — with a completely casual attitude, as if it were nothing special. It was the awkward reaction that would have stood out here, not the expression of interest.

"Ah… I'm sorry. I don't use social media…"

It wasn't an excuse; it was the truth.

"Well, that's okay. We kind of figured."

Instead of the freckled man, the bearded man shrugged and easily stepped back.

As they left, they attempted another loud high-five, playfully shoving the freckled man forward to prompt a high-five between him and me. Perhaps the freckled man was only acting with exaggerated playfulness fueled by alcohol, but the delight on his face — as if he had just shaken hands with a favorite celebrity — was genuinely memorable.

That must have been because no one, regardless of gender, had ever expressed their liking for me so directly and openly before. Inwu hyung had been somewhat like that, but he was always playful. Probably more than half of it was just joking, in the end.

After they left, nuna and hyung also got off their stools to light up another cigarette. While smoking was generally prohibited indoors, in Hong Kong outdoor smoking seemed to face almost no restriction anywhere. He had just finished one cigarette, but lit a new one along with nuna and hyung. Then, he took a few steps back, raising his camera to capture them.

It was exactly the scene I had seen in the Old Future post.

The setting was different, and hyung and nuna were dressed differently, but the situation matched the photograph credited with "Photo by Kun."

The two of them, naturally blending into the streets of Soho, comfortably enjoying the moment in their own way — and him, just as naturally capturing those moments of theirs in a photograph.

Suddenly, all the noise around me faded away. There was no barrier between them and me, and he wasn't erecting an invisible glass wall between us like before — yet the mere few steps separating us felt like a distinct dividing line between the people who shone and myself, who did not.

Just as I reached for my beer with a touch of bitterness, his lens suddenly turned toward me.

Before I even had a chance to look away, the shutter clicked. He immediately checked the photo on the LCD screen. Watching him bring the cigarette to lips faintly curved in a smile, I stepped down from the stool and approached them.

Nuna smiled and draped her arm over my shoulder.

"Seo Ihyeon, your popularity is truly international."

Nuna's words drew laughter from hyung too. But he just looked down at me while taking a drag from his cigarette, offering no smile.

"I… I'd like to try smoking too."

"……"

All three of them stopped mid-drag and focused on me. Wondering if I'd said something I shouldn't have, I scanned their expressions one by one. Finally I looked up at his face. He slowly moved the hand that had paused while bringing the cigarette to his lips, and drew on the filter again. The ash-gray ember burned red at the corner of his mouth.

Nuna tilted her head slightly and smiled.

"Can I ask why you want to try?"

"Before… when I saw nuna's post about Hong Kong on the Old Future site. I thought… that if I ever got to go to Hong Kong, I'd want to try it at least once."

I added, stroking my arm.

"At the time, I didn't know I'd be coming to Hong Kong this soon."

Nuna removed the arm she had draped around my neck and nodded.

"Well, it wouldn't make sense for us to tell you it's bad for you when we're right here smoking ourselves."

Then she looked up at him and asked:

"Is it okay to give him one?"

"Why are you asking my permission? Is there a minor here?"

Nuna gave a slight smile — the look of someone who had expected exactly that answer. Then she rummaged through her back pants pocket. As she handed me a cigarette and a lighter, she shook her head lightly.

"Ugh, why do I feel like I'm doing something bad? You are twenty-two, right?"

Nuna and hyung were people you could barely call smokers. So I could understand completely why they wouldn't want to encourage me to start. Instead of launching into a lengthy explanation that I had no intention of becoming a smoker, I just smiled, and nuna smiled back, ruffling my hair. Then the two of them dove back into the pub as the music changed.

Watching them instantly get caught up in the crowd — perhaps it was a song they liked — I brought the cigarette in my hand to my lips.

Every single step — striking the lighter, holding the flame to the tip of the cigarette, and drawing in that first puff — felt clumsy, even to me.

Contrary to what he had said, implying it was no big deal, he was watching every step of my awkward first attempt at smoking with an embarrassing intensity. Then he picked up his camera.

"Don't… take pictures."

I pulled down his wrist as he adjusted the lens toward me and turned my head away.

"Why not?"

His voice held a hint of amusement.

"It wouldn't be interesting to photograph."

"Are you saying the pictures I take aren't interesting?"

"……"

Even knowing he was joking, I didn't want him to misunderstand, and my gaze wavered. He seized the momentary pause to point the lens at me again. The shutter clicked in an instant.

"At least, the pictures I take of you, Seo Ihyeon — those seem interesting to me."

He lowered the camera as if satisfied and leaned his hand on the railing beside me. His chest and shoulder, angled toward me, were right in front of my eyes. I wanted to lean into him — using the dizziness from the mixed tequila and beer, and the disorientation of having smoked for the first time, as an excuse.

But that would have been an overstep — an act too bold to attempt, let alone carry out on impulse. Surprised by the very thought, I took another drag of the cigarette, as if trying to blow away the notion with its noxious smoke.

The unfamiliar, acrid air felt like it was constricting my throat. My tongue tingled, and I vividly sensed that I was injecting harmful substances into my windpipe and lungs.

Even when I was younger and more naive, I had never thought smoking looked cool. Nor was I developing some belated, affected sense of style now. As nuna had written in her post, I just wanted to share that feeling of releasing the tension that kept one's everyday self in check — perhaps a little recklessly, or generously — and looking around at the surroundings.

To be more honest, I wanted to get a little closer to the "Wonderland" that included nuna, hyung, and him. In the end, a weak laugh escaped me as I wondered if this was just the childish urge to imitate — like mimicking a favorite actor's performance in a movie.

"It really feels like I've come to a strange land."

The wooziness spinning before my eyes made my voice naturally languid.

I focused on him, watching me without a single eyebrow raised.

"Mr. Rabbit."

"Rabbit?"

This time, one of his eyebrows arched upward. Mr. Rabbit. The words had slipped out before I could stop them. I wiped my face with the hand not holding the cigarette, trying to regain my composure, and laughed to myself. Looking back, he truly was the Mr. Rabbit who had led me into this Wonderland.

"I'm sorry. I must be drunk. Strange things keep coming out of my mouth."

To hide the heat rising in my face, I took one last drag from the almost-finished cigarette. His hand reached out and covered mine where I held the cigarette, then gently took it from between my lips. It was a very soft touch.

When I looked up, he was looking down at me, drawing a deep drag from the cigarette he'd taken — so deep his cheeks hollowed slightly. Then he slowly exhaled a long stream of smoke through his lips and skillfully tapped the ash off with his index finger.

"Let's get drunker, then. That's what we came out for."

As he tossed the butt into the ashtray the pub provided and turned to leave the railing area, someone carefully grasped my arm.

"Excuse me…"

"……"

It was the freckled man. My eyes widened involuntarily at the unexpected situation.

The man's companions were nowhere in sight. He seemed to have rushed back the way he came, his breathing ragged and his face flushed.

"Sorry, but I was wondering if we could perhaps exchange email addresses."

The man smiled, looking into my eyes, though he seemed somewhat shy.

I felt something pure emanating from the man's goodwill, like raw energy. It was different from the sticky flirting the man at the VIP preview had used while hinting at travel memories. To feel such genuine goodwill toward someone, and to express it so openly yet cleanly… separate from the fact that the goodwill was directed at me, it simply looked wonderful.

"Actually, I'm planning a trip to Korea this winter, and I thought maybe we could exchange emails, and if things go well, perhaps meet up again in Seoul then… Ah, please forget what that guy said earlier about me being instantly smitten! It's just that, it's such a long distance anyway, and I thought we could at least be friends…"

While nervously rubbing the back of his neck, the man kept glancing sideways at him. He was certainly not oblivious when it came to matters like this, yet for some reason he wasn't leaving, choosing instead to stay and witness the entire situation.

"Ah… my boy…friend… he's a bit particular about that sort of thing. I'm sorry."

The man's confession wasn't unpleasant at all, and I was genuinely interested in his background — just as he had said, enough to want to be friends. However, I couldn't deny that my heart was elsewhere.

I was completely unaccustomed to receiving confessions, nor did I know how to gracefully sidestep such a situation, so I clumsily spun a lie based on something I'd seen or heard somewhere.

"I see. So… you already have a boyfriend."

As I glanced over at the man offering a bittersweet smile, I suddenly realized my mistake. I hadn't meant to imply I had a "boyfriend," but I could see how it had come out that way.

"Well then. I hope you have a wonderful trip. It was nice talking with you."

Watching the young man turn away, his disappointment plainly visible, I felt a pang of regret. I regretted responding so dishonestly to such sincere goodwill with a needless lie.

"Hmm… I didn't realize you had a boyfriend."

I also felt apologetic toward the man who had just, by circumstance, become my boyfriend. Contrary to my worries, however, he seemed completely unbothered by the misunderstanding — in fact, he appeared rather pleased.

"You know I don't."

The embarrassment of having exposed the entire scene of confession and rejection to him washed over me belatedly, and as soon as I sat down I drank beer after beer. Nuna and hyung must have gone deep into the back of the hall, as they were nowhere in sight.

"I didn't know. How would I? Did we ever talk about such things?"

He remained full of playful energy, in a very good mood for reasons unknown.

Wanting to change the subject somehow, I reached out toward the camera hanging around his neck.

"Can I see the pictures?"

"……"

As my hand touched the camera, he stiffened. It was a bold move for me — but since I hadn't actually touched him, I hadn't expected such a startled reaction. Normally, I would have backed off at this point, but a slightly mischievous stubbornness surfaced. Sometimes this happened around him, even without the excuse of being tipsy.

"You won't let me?"

He pulled the camera closer toward himself and asked one more time.

He didn't seem like the type to strap a camera around his neck and head out into the streets upon arriving in a new city, so it was quite surprising when he casually slipped the strap over his neck as he got out of the car. The sight of him with this compact camera — smaller than his palm — made him look like an excited tourist on a trip. Which was, somehow… a little endearing.

"Hmm… I don't think I should show you."

He removed the strap, held the camera in his left hand, and stretched his arm out of my reach as he spoke.

"Why not?"

I asked with a hint of dissatisfaction. He had taken plenty of pictures even while I, unused to cameras, felt awkward, yet now he wouldn't show me the results. It felt unfair.

"Seo Ihyeon, you're a fortune teller. If you look at my photos, you'll read everything about me, won't you?"

"…Read what?"

"……"

Our eyes met. I had said it without much thought, but he instantly clamped his mouth shut, like someone whose secret had been exposed. Somehow, I had ended up lunging toward him as if trying to snatch the camera into my chest, and he had his arm wrapped around my back, pulling me backward to stop me.

At that very close distance, his eyes meticulously scanned every part of my face, as if searching for something. He would look at me like this sometimes. Perhaps because we were so close, the scent of his cologne tickled my nose.

"That time — how much did you drink with Choi Inwu?"

"What? When…"

At the unexpected mention of Inwu hyung's name, I was just trying to dredge up the memory when Juhan hyung suddenly appeared from behind and threw himself onto him in an embrace, as if piggybacking.

"Director, I'm dying of thirst! Beer, give me beer!"

"Ah… this is really annoying."

He grumbled with an openly vexed expression, but because his attitude was no different than usual, it all felt like a joke. Neither hyung nor nuna seemed to care at all.

"You can stay out later, so why don't you two go hang out somewhere else? Want to go to a club? I'll give you my card."

"I'd love to go out, but we still have two days left for the fair, so we should be back in bed by midnight. We can party to our heart's content at the Sunday party."

Draining the beer left in his glass, hyung fanned his sweat-soaked face with his hand.

The tension that had been tautly drawn between him and me just moments before vanished as if it had never been, and our table, like all the others surrounding us, instantly erupted into lively chatter.

"Wait a minute. But why are you suddenly trying to send us to a club? We always have to be back by midnight before the fair ends."

Nuna eyed him suspiciously from beneath narrowed lids.

"You're planning on sending us to a club so you can slip away somewhere nice by yourself, aren't you?"

Wiping the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, hyung jumped up this time. He scowled and reattached the camera strap around his neck — which he had loosened to keep it out of harm's way.

"You weren't sitting still, so I said if you're going to be like that, just go to a club. Is this really something to be suspicious about?"

"Hmm… He's not the type to do that…"

"If you're not going, then get up. I need to drop you off at your hotel and then go pick up Manager Han."

He glanced at the watch on his left wrist and stood up from his seat.

Manager Han, who was responsible for Phantom's operations, was also attending parties hosted by various galleries that evening. Since he had an obligation to pick her up, even if nuna and hyung went to the club, he couldn't just slip away to a "nice place."

We left the pub and waited for a car near a nearby crosswalk. Nuna and hyung hadn't quite calmed down yet — they couldn't stand still for a moment, swaying to the music drifting from the surrounding shops. It was time for us to return to our lodging, but Soho's Friday night was still in full swing.

I felt regretful. Because of the alcohol, my emotions were surely more exposed than usual. To hide even a fraction of my feelings, I shouldn't have been looking at him — yet my gaze kept searching for him.

In truth, I had a lot I wanted to say. Since I wasn't very articulate, even if I were given the chance, I probably wouldn't be able to steer the conversation skillfully — but I also had many questions.

What was the source of his alienation — the non-universal kind that had made him empathize with Alienation? When he realized that Alienation was my painting… how had he felt? Was he disappointed, or was it unexpected? Or perhaps, no matter how much he cherished the painting, the artist and the work were entirely separate entities to him — meaning the painting itself had never made him see me differently at all.

Such… miscellaneous and trivial thoughts.

He looked at me, arms tightly crossed over his chest, then sighed and ran a hand through his hair. With a sharp click of his tongue, he strode closer and grabbed my arm forcefully, as if about to lift me up.

"And you're still a Beta, even now?"

After that murmur — which demanded no answer from me — he stared straight down at me with eyes that sparked like embers.

"On Sunday, I will not be interrupted."

I didn't know what kind of interruption he meant, but the sudden onslaught of his fragrance — seeming to engulf me entirely — made such details irrelevant. I had once thought of his scent as merely strange. Now I was already craving it.